Grey River Argus WEDNESDAY, November 30, 1927. THE FARMERS AND THE REFORMERS.

Grey River Argus, 30 November 1927, Page 4

Grey River Argus WEDNESDAY, November 30, 1927. THE FARMERS AND THE REFORMERS.

One of the reasons why the Reform Party is threatened with disintregation is that the producing classes feel it is tied to the chariot wheels of the money monopolists. Thus the Rural Credits Bill is discredited by the men on the land because it offers no ready and sure chance for them to finance produce in bond, the dropping of this proviso by the Government having in the eyes of most farmers spoiled the whole scheme. It is asked whether the bank rate has not been pushed up in New Zealand above other countries to an undue extent at present, and whether the price of money must not fall before 36 years have passed, so that the Rural Credits Boards will naurally re-fund their loans, taking advantage of the lower rates, and such operations will add very materially to ordinary profits. Therefore, it is suggested that a greater degree of independence for the farmers’ finance scheme should have been provided for, and that the best thing now may be an agricultural bank entirely outside State red tape ami restrictions. Such a proposal l

in view of the degree to which so many farmers are tied up with mortgages, may seem of doubtful wisdom, but it serves to show the distrust entertained towards the Government that has always posed as the farmers’ friend. The farming community, however, has another count against the Government, namely, the increase in the Customs Tariff, but so far as secondary industries are concerned there is at least room for two opinions, and the farmers are doubtless thinking of themselves alone when they argue that any industry which the tariff is able to help is an unprofitable one for the country. However, the real nature of the Reform measure to exclude farming from the scope of the Arbitration Court is now beginning- to. be realised, as the farmers ’ journal. “Farming First” remarks:—A few months ago an agitation for the abolition of the Arbitration Court, well-flogged by politicians, was “wished on” to farmers, resolutions were sent out to the press wherever a small Farmers’ Union Branch could be got together to take action, and the air fairly whistled with propaganda. The mountain’s pup is once more a mole-hill. It is all a political game!” The same paper remarks on the fact that in order to fool the farmer, the Reform politicians “are making Labour the only alternative to vested interests.” It adds: —“It is ‘Take your hiding- from Capital, or be thrown into the hounds of Labour, ’ and many, bleeding from sore stripes, go to the dogs in the hope that they are better than the lietors of Capitalism. The real labourer of New Zealand is the farmer. He is continually saving, to add to a capital interest which is supposed to be about half the capital of the country, but he does not average a working man’s wage, even if his capital is forgotten. ’ ’ The writing of a certain Reform politician under a “nom de plume” in the “Exporter,” are thus summarised by the aforementioned farmers’ paper : —Such men ‘ ‘ would give the farmer no choice, except that between a party financed by financial and city interests, or a partv kept by Labour’s pence. They would take good care that the farmer shall never present a united front to all foes. Such men are not. whatever they think themselves, the friends, but the most dangerous of all enemies, to the farmer. They would keep him stabilised in hopelessness, because while he remains in a state of apathetic resignation he is an easy prey to those who finance the Party’s activities. If the farmer awoke, even though he never succeeded in putting one man in Parliament, the bargaining- powers of a unified farming- vote would ensure a vastly different treatment to that which the huge farm vote cast for Mr. Coates at last election has brought the man on the land.”