INCREASED COSTS

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXX, Issue 4875, 25 July 1936, Page 5

INCREASED COSTS

BURDEN ON FARMERS. MR. W. J. POLSON'S FIGURES. Figures relating to increased costs through the recent legislation were quoted by Mr. W. J. Poison (Opposition, Stratford) during the continuation of the Finance Bill debate in the House yesterday. The primary producer, he declared, would have to stagger under the whole weight of the increases provided in the measures passed by the Government. Every sheep killed would cost Is 4d more to export and every bobby calf'7d more, and these costs would be deducted from every animal the farmer sold. The actual increase in the cost of manufacturing butter through the new legislation was 2-5 of a penny a pound. Prices were rising, and although the Minister of Commerce, the Hon. D. G. Sullivan, under the Board of Trade Act had more powers than anyone else in the Cabinet, he was settingup a special tribunal to deal with prices, to show l Kow keen was the Government to keep them down. Mr. Poison suggested that the Government had broken three important promises. It had not removed the sales tax, it had distorted its promise to provide a guaranteed price for dairy produce, and instead of immediately restoring the salaries of public servants it had delayed till July 1.