DAIRY PRODUCE CONTROL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19453, 8 October 1926, Page 8

DAIRY PRODUCE CONTROL.

Sir, —Perhaps some of your readers who have supported absolute control might be able to enlighten some of us why, under absolute control, Danish butter is quoted as high as 30s per cwt. over that of New Zealand when, during the past season without control, the difference was only about 2s per cwt. Absolute control can never be a success, because it is a lajv that is against all sound argument, and it refuses the right of individuals to say what they will do with the product of their own labour. It is unsound in. principle, socialistic in the extreme, and without a doubt- the thin end of the wedge of the nationalisation of the means of production, which is the main, plank of the platform of the Labour Party, and which our Reform Party and Mr. Coates roundly denounced at the last election campaign. Yet the same party refused to listen to the pleadings of a large section 6f the producers of this country before this measure came before Parliament. Mr. Coates and also the Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Haw ken, have been asked to give the producers the right to say whether they would have absolnte control or not by a referendum of the producers, but they have turned a deaf ear to all the representations that have been made to them. We ought to have had an election of the full board this year, but the Government held it was only necessary for three members to retire. What is the result ? Under their own system of voting on tonnage basis, which they fought for tooth and nail, and which no doubt they thought they were quite safe under, we got Mr. lorns returned unopposed, and we all know quite well that he is opposed to absolute control, and also to any system of voting which denies the right of the producer to cast his own vote. We also find two members pledged to fight absolute control elected to fill the vacancies on the Control Board, with a large majority over the sitting members. If there had been a full election, which there should have been, I say there would have been only one absolute control member returned, and. although he is the body and soul of absolute control, he would have had a poor show of carrying on with the majority against him. Thank goodness that the poor "Cocky" is just beginning to wake up. Through the operation of control we are going to get an advance this season of fourpeneo or fivepence per lb. less for our butter-fat. I am a producer of butter-fat and have two farms and another family dependent on the. butter-fat- cheque, besides mv own. I have the producers' interests at heart and have followed this great question up very closely ever since control was mooted, and I say without fear of contradiction that absolute control will never be anything but- a failure, unless the board were in a position to control all imports of dairy produce into the United Kingdom from whatever country they came. Frank Edwards. Horsham Downs. Hamilton, October 6, 1926.