MR NASH HAS A “HIDE”

Greymouth Evening Star, 9 October 1948, Page 4

MR NASH HAS A “HIDE”

In their dealings with the farmers. New Zealand’s Labour politicians are suspiciously like the Bourbons; they learn nothing and tney forget nothing, states the New Zealand Herald. The farmers complain that they are being treated unfairly in the matter of prices for their hides, pelts, calfskins and tallow. They put forward a clear case of subsidised local consumption at their expense. Mr Nash, who is left to reply for the Government, does not forget that the farmers have opposed most of his schemes of socialised distribution, nor has he learned the fallacy of denying freedom to the producers. . . Clearly the local consumer gets something cheap and the producer is denied the full yield of the export market. To make matters worse, the individual producer has no title to his proportionate share in stabilisation funds held for the problematical benefit of such an ill-defined entity as “the industry.” The farmer sees bis export income cut by 20 per cent, through the return to exchange parity, and at the same time is forced to simply local industries at even lower prices. It is another example of stabilisation made lop-sided. The Australian vernacular, frequently borrowed in New Zealand. has a reference to the “hide of Ned Kelly.” Farmers in this instance may be tempted to vary the wording.