FARMERS AND THE TARIFF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13813, 28 July 1908, Page 7

FARMERS AND THE TARIFF.

Mr. S. Cochrane Macky, secretary of the Empire and Tariff Reform League, writes: — It has been exceedingly disheartening to me— has been working for the past seven years in the farmers' interest—to read tho press reports of the various provincial conferences, and find so little has been clone to advance the best interests of the workers on the soil. The majority of the remits from the branch unions to the conferences were hardly what one might expect from a body of men who realised the power they could be in the Dominion, but more like a body of serfs who were petitioning their masters for some favours, as they were absolutely puerile and parochial. A few, however, were in marked contrast to those just referred to, and the men who drafted them are to be commended, and are worthy of seats in the next Parliament. Tho Auckland conference was the only one which seemed to revise, that for the last 20 years those who have been enriching the Dominion by their, exports, viz., the goldminers, gumdiggers, flaxmillers, and farmers, have been seriously handicapped through beinc forced by a tariff law to carry all the other so-called local industries on their shoulders,- and .that the time, had arrived when a determined effort should be made to remove the burden, and they advocated the formation of a new political party, whose object would be to return members to Parliament pledged to get all protective duties abolished. The Auckland Conference deserve credit for their action in this matter, but, from tho published reports of the Colonial Conference last year, there is likely to bo just as much opposition to the" proposal for the complete abolition of protective duties this year as there was then, so far as the duty on wheat 'and flour is concerned. In conversation with a delegate to %he Auckland Conference, I got a severe shock. He told me that, although he knew that the fifth plank in the Farmers' Union platform was"" That taxation through the ' Customs should be for the purpose of raising revenue, and not for protective purposes," yet he considered some industries should bo protected. He named one, which he said could not exist without protection, and when I informed him that shares in. the company he named were selling that day at 150 per cent, premium, and paying large dividends in consequence of protection, he stated he was glad to hear it. This man should not have been accepted as a member of the Farmers' Union, no^'elected as a delegate to the conference.

At the Wellington Provincial Conference, a day or two after, the following motion was carried: '" That, owing to the almost prohibitive price of building timber, the Government be urged to remove the import duty therefrom." The conference evidently forgot that, accordng to the fifth plank in their platform, it was their duty to ask the Government, to remove all protective duties, and if the latter did not accede to their re quest, then they have the remedy in their own hands. Ab the coming election they can combine and return members to Parliament pledged to make the plank referred to operative...

I noticed that, the North Canterbury provincial president was bemoaning the fact that there ie still a clamour for the removal of the import duty on wheat, and, as he is evidently of opinion that Canterbury farmers could not grow wheat if the import duty was abolished, I will give him a few facts which I have been at a good deal of trouble to obtain, and he will see from these that we have nothing to fear from Australia. From 1895 to 1900 inclusive we had exported to the Commonwealth bushels more oats than we imported from it. In potatoes we were to credit for the same period 71,516 tons, wheat 731,946 bushels, and flour 15,141 tons 6 centals. Then, from 1901 "to 1906 inclusive, the Commonwealth sept us 2957 tons 10 centals more flour than we sent to Australia, whilst during the same period we had a credi - . balance of 225,452 bushels, equal to 6039 tons, of wheat in our favour, although thev had a credit balance of 2957£ tons flour. The reason of this is to be found in the fact, that in the last six years all those connected with flourmills had interviewed the Arbitration Court, and obtained higher wages,'so we exported wheat instead of flour. Our account with Australia for the 12 years' shows that we had credit balances as follows:—Oats, bushels; ' wheat, - 957,398 bushels; flour, 12,183 tons 16 centals; potatoes, 110,949 tons. It will be seen from the' above that we have absolutely nothing to fear if we had freetrade with the Commonwealth, provided we had got rid of all protective duties. The tables are most interesting, but too long to" give here; jait one instance, and it is this: In 1595 our imports of wheat from Australia were 58,231 centals; flour. 23,816 centals; and in 1896 five centals wheat and 1100 centals flour, whilst we exported same year (1896) 368.262 bushels wheat to the Commonwealth, and 6045 tons, equal 120,900 centals, flour. I have collated the foregoing facts for the benefit of the Colonial Conference of the New Zealand Farmers' Union, which will meet this week in Wellington. The union have found out by painful experience that their resolutions are treated with contempt by the Government, and the time has arrived for them to take action. There may, howover, be too many members of. the union interested in protected industries, and who only act as drags on the chariot wheels. If so, let the real live members of the unifo join the Empire and Tariff Reform League, whose platform is not only to get fair play for the farmers of this Dominion, but all the self-governing British dependencies, and our election cry is "tariff reform."