FARM WAGES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22685, 24 March 1937, Page 16

FARM WAGES

SUBSIDY SCHEME

LITTLE ENTHUSIASM SHOWN NO INCENTIVE OFFERED [BY TELEGRAIMI —PRESS ASSOCIATION'] DUNEDIX, Tuesday If opinions expressed by several pastoralists and farmers to-day on the Government's wages subsidy plan can be regarded as representative, there will be little support for the Minister of Labour's proposal. No one interviewed seemed to be at all impressed by the offer, and in more than one instance it was suggested that only a few small dairy farmers would be interested. A Central Otago settler said he would not bo prepared to tnlco on a boy even with a subsidy under the conditions laid down, ft was impossible for a farmer to decide at the end of one week whether a youth was worth training or not. Town-bred boys took longer than a week to get their "country legs" and he thought it was fair to neither fanner nor boy to expect a decision in so short a time. " Tired of the Problem "

If a farmer decided after one week that he would give a boy a trial, he would lose all tho subsidy if ho did not keep him for four months. Most boys would need a month to become accustomed to the work, but there was no incentive to farmers to persevere with them for such a period. Another farmer said he had decided to rely on mechanical farming and his own family in future, so that he was not likely to bo interested in tho scheme. He was of the opinion that the majority of farmers were tired to death of the farm labour problem. It was two or three years old now, and most of them were endeavouring vo do without labour wherever possible. Public Works Luro In several quarters the lure of Public Works wages was stated to bo an effective deterrent to any system of training young farm labour. It was regarded as useless wasting time on young men who would merely make a convenience of their employers and tho Government until they could get away to a Public Works Department contract and earn ISs to 19s a day. Farmers could never expect to cope with such competition. .It was generally agreed that it was futile to try.

Small dairy farmers and orchardists were considered to be tho only type of farmer who would benefit from such a scheme. Even in their case it was considered that the system would bo unsatisfactory, for the reason that it would be open to abuse. What might be regarded as a typical view was given by a South Otago farmer. He said tho only boy who was worth training, and who could be expected to go through with it. was the young fortunate who was likely at some time to have sufficient backing to get on the land for himself. Without it they might as well all be handed over to the Public Works Department.