THE KAURI GUM BILL

Northland Age, Volume 25, Issue 26, 15 October 1925, Page 3

THE KAURI GUM BILL

AN EXPERIMENT IN TRUST. (By Keri Keri) The lion is to lie down with the lamb and the Governmental little twins are to ted them ! Just now, control bills are in the air. “Control” is all right, it is O.K. when the right people have control. But 'he butter people, or the meat people, would net think of handing the control of their iudustry over to the merchants, nor tven of giving it into the hands of a Government-and-Merchant junta. The wicked storekeepers, who used to buy all the gum and hold it, (incidentally finding ne finance), are to be cut out. The terchants are to be kept in. They are 0 have one seat on the Board, the diggers are to have- two, there are to be two Government appointees and one ot these latter ts to have the usual casting vote. There tre thus two diggers’ votes and four others if the chairman’s casting vote is included; enough to make a fine show of impartially and yet to turn the scale down with a jang against the produce”!. So much for he nature of “Control.” The storekeepers are apparently quite unnecessary in the scheme of things, but die merchants we cannot do without, n’est ce pas ? As a matter of fact, as long as the merchants are in it at all, they wiii be the controlling factor and will da as they like. Perhaps they will give good prices .'or a time, there is plenty of scope. The Minister for Lands, introducing the second reading of the Bill, said that it was on lines similar to other control bills ut through the House. Not too similar ! his calf has been bom with ticks on it. he Meat and Dairy Control Boards do ot consist of merchants’ representatives, government appointees and producers, with the producers in a decided minority. Mr. Masters pointed Out that the “people of the North were very trusting people if they agreed that the Minister should fix the levy on gum at anything he likes.” if that were the whole extent of the trust, it would not be so bad. The producers are being catied on to trust everyone, with he exception of the small storekeeper, who nas hitherto trusted them. According to an interjection recorded in Hansard there are about 700 men engaged in gum digging. The export value of gum has been about half a million per annum—£s96,ooo in 1923. Each digger was therefore responsible for producing about £BSO exportable value of gum. f

That the digger gets only the merest lookin at the profit is very obvious. A remedy is needed and badly needed, but the Bill will not supply it. (The average export price per ton during the first ten months of 1924 was £B3 10 0. Almost all gum is now low grade.) The finance available under the provisions of the Act is £IOO,OOO and that will be ; gone in a very short time. The digger is to get “advances;”—whut “advances" is not clear. They cannot be much with finance so strictly limited. Many diggers are well "advanced” already bv the storekeepers and it will take their earnings, not advances, to keep them going. A fraction of their earnings will not do. What will happen ? Sly gumming, or illicit gum buying, wherein a licensed gum digger who is financial, or c in get finance will buy at his own price, and we all know who these people are likely to be. Gum is not like butter, cheese and meat when it comes to marketing. It is a side line with many of those who export it and with mast of those who buy at home. That makes it almost impossible to come to any arrangement with those at home, apart from the Auckland merchants. The home buyers will not prejudice their connections with this side for the sake of the comparitively unimportant line of kauri gum. But, as with most difficulties, the bold course is the best and if the Government had elected to take that course, a producers’ monopoly of kauri gum would have solved the problem. The difference between the Kauri Gum Board and the other Boards would then have been in the necessity for the provision of initial finance on a liberal scale by tile State. This could have been recouped gradually from the levies. . There would be no difficulty in selling any gum that would be otherwise saleable if all gum were pooled, and that is what it must come to sooner or later, if the marketing of gum in the producers’ interest is to he seriously attempted. Aieanvv'.V/i he Kauri Gum Control Bill reminds the writer 0:’ little anecdote which appeared in the “Age," miaer “Wise and Otherwise” lately:— An elephant was walking in a jungle when he came to pheasant’s nest and tound that the mother bird bad flown away. The small birds looked very lonely and cold and hungry. “Poor little (hings,”said the elephant in a sentimental voice. “They have no mother.” And lie sat down on the nest.