THE FOUL BROOD BILL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9134, 16 August 1888, Page 3

THE FOUL BROOD BILL.

TO THE EDITOR.

Sir,— lt is contrary to ray wish to carry on a newspaper controversy anent the Foul Brood Bill, particularly so with opponents who are in utter ignorance of its provisions. I must, however, crave space to reply to Mr. Atkin before withdrawing, lest the readers of his letter should be misled into the belief that the members of the New Zealand Beekeepers' Association are trying to introduce an oppressive piece of legislation the burden of which will fall on the general taxpayer. There is no reasonabla excuse for Mr. Atkin, or indeed for any person, writing in ignorance of the provisions of the Act, as the draft of it has been published in the Australasian Bee Journal and sent to every progressive beekeeper in the colony ; copies can also be obtained by any person at the publishing office of the Journal for sixpence, or if a person interested cannot afford sixpence, one will be him. Now, in the first place, the executive committee of the Association who drafted the Bill are men of sound common sense, with sufficient practical knowledge of apiculture to understand exactly what is required for the good of the industry, and in the next place they were particularly careful to- avoid introducing anything that might bear hard upon any individual beekeeper, even were he the owner of diseased bees. Mr. Atkin says : — "If the 500 beekeepers appointed andpaid for an inspector themselves, no one outside their own body would have a right to complain." Applying his own argument to the case, he then had no right to complain, for this is just what the Act provides, and that without imposing a tax on beekeepers. Not one farthing is asked for from the "public treasury," there will be no snug billets for anyone, and I believe the Bill as a whole to be one of the best of its kind ever introduced into the New Zealand Parliament. A few words as to the needs of a foul brood Act, and I am done. Foul brood is an infectious disease comparable to pebrine in silkworms, curable in its early stages, but terribly destructive if neglected. It is so infectious that from one diseased colony of bees foul brood will spread over a large district in a very short time if the necessary steps are not taken tc keep it down or stamp it out. The disease has spread to an alarming extent all over the country through the neglect of careless beekeepers, in fact careful beekeepers are now at the mercy of the former, for it is labour in vain- to try to rid your apiary of disease while you have a careless neighbour propagating it. All that we desire is, power to compel the owner of infected bees either to apply the proper remedies to cure them, or destroy everything that endangers his neighbours' bees and the industry of apiculture. Who, then, while we are prepared to work the Act without expense to the country, shall say that we have not a right to ask for this protection ? Is it not worse than robbery to deprive your neighbour of his living through your carelessness and neglect? for in the one case you have a chance of bringing your enemy to book, and in the other you have not. Ido hope that in the future anyone feeling an iuterest in the question will read the Act before commenting on the action of the New Zealand Beekeepers' Association.— J am, etc., I. Hopkins,

Hon. SecT N^B.K.A.

TO THE EDITOR. Sik, — Two of your correspondents in Saturday's paper ;vre very angry with Mrs. Alrtis for her reference to the Foul Brood Bees Bill. They do not refute ;my of her statements. "The Bill," as Mrs. Aldis stated, " does encourage neighbour to spy upon neighbour, aud to report his sus-

picions to a Jack-in-office, who is to fee armed with inquisitorial powere as injurious to beekeepers as the provisions of the Codlin Moth Bill would have been to fruit-growers." The Bill, in fact, is one to enable the experts of the Beekeepers' Association to air their fads, and enforce them on all keepers of bees at the expense of the nation. Mr. Kendall's statement, that " beekeepers" are unanimous in desiring the passage of the Bill, is absolutely false, if the word "beekeeper" means "a person who keeps bees," and even if it were true, the public who eat honey have a righto to a voice in the matter, as they would have to pay, first, for the direct expense involved by the provisions of the Bill, and, secondly, for the effects of the monopoly which ib would tend to produce. Seven years ago Mr. Hopkins had had no personal experience of foul brood. If by this time it haa become a sufficiently dreadful pest to justify him in demanding an Act of Parliament to protect him, it speaks but poorly for the socalled scientific beekeeping which he has done so much to introduce. The Foul Brood in Bees Bill, like the Codlin Moth" Bill, is a trades union attempt to make the State pay the expense, while private persona reap the profit. In one respect the Foul Brood Bill is the worse of the two, for while possibly the negligence of State-appointed officials may have contributed to the introduction and spread of the codlin moth, it has not been laid to the charge of the Government that they have produced disease among the bees.—l am, &a, W. Steadmax AxDis. -