GO SLOW

Evening Star, Issue 19918, 14 July 1928, Page 3

GO SLOW

MINISTER AND WHEAT GROWERS REPORT DENIED [Fbou Ouk Paelumentaet Rkpoeteb.) WELLINGTON, July 13. Workers were accused of taking advantage of farmers during the. busy season by going slow, remarked Mr R M'Keen, a Labour speaker, during the Addrcss-in-Reply debate, but the Minister of Lands, ho said, had advised tho farmers in Canterbury to hold their wheat for a higher price. That, ho considered, was tantamount to asking the farmers to go slow. “I did nothing of tho kind,” declared tho Hon. A. D. M'Leod, at once. He followed this denial with a formal statement to the House tonight after he had had an opportunity of consulting tho notes of an interview which took place on the railway platform at Ashburton. The express stopped for two or three minutes, .he explained, and two gentlemen representing the whoatgrowers asked if he, as Minister of Industries and Commerce, would lako steps to compel the (lounnillers to pay 6s per bushel for wheat, or, as an alternative, to sell their flour on a parity of ds 3d per bushel, which they were paying for wheat. “My reply was that T could not recommend the Government to do as asked. Parliament, after going very carefully into the whole matter, had almost unanimously decided that a sliding scale of duty on wheat imports should ho imposed, which would ensure Cs per bushel to growers, and if the growers would not so organise as to assure that price I was afraid they could not look to the Government for compulsion in the matter. That was the statement I made, and’ what I stand by.”