PROPOSED MEAT POOL

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18443, 3 January 1922, Page 2

PROPOSED MEAT POOL

OPPOSITION IN TARANAKI. ENCOURAGEMENT OF GAMBLING. (Fbom Oub Own Coebesbondent.) HAWEHA, January 2. Farmers dong the West Coast are not too optimistic concerning the meat pbol, and at meetings held a good deal of op position is being shown. This may _be that they do not understand the position thoroughly. Mr Newton King, tjne of the leading stock and station agents and business men of the Taranaki district, expressed the opinion that all were faced with grave difficulties, and it behoved them to use their brains to get the best possible results. . Ho confessed that he ,was not enamoured of the present scheme which was a restriction on trade, and consequently dangerous. The present storage of meat, butter, cheese, and wool in England was due to the control of the Government or boards which controlled the produce. If it hod been in commercial hands all would'have 'been sold. Government interference in these matters, all would agree, was a failure, end fraught with difficulties and dangers. Personally, he could not see where advances wore to come from, and as regards freights and finance, ho could not see what advantage pool boards would have oyer an organisation of freezing works. There was the further risk of •buying the whole of the season ahead, thus gambling right ahead on the London market. Directors, therefore, would have to be careful. At the present time directors of freezing companies had to judge form reports of local works. He thought they would 1m bettor able to form an opinion than would some gentlemen on the Pool Board, who might form a correct judgment of the matter, but on the other hand, they might judge quite wrongly.

FURTHER PROTEST FROM LONDON. (Peb United Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, January 2. The following further resolution passed at a second meeting held in London of representatives of proprietary companies owning 17 freezing works in New Zealand, was handed to the High Commissioner for transmission to the Prime Minister:— “That this further meeting, representing proprietary freezing companies established both in the United Kingdom and New Zealand, and representing also certain other proprietary companies with established buying connections in New Zealand in the light of the further facts received by cable, still consider the abandonment of all dominion buying for export will, of necessity, result from any scheme which does not preserve full proprietary right for meat purchased in the dominion, and- freedom to market and distribute without any outside interference whatever at cither end. “This meeting further strongly urges that any scheme .should be strictly limited to those desiring to take advantage of its financial provisions, and that all buying companies and licensed exporters should be free to continue their buying operations as in the past.”

SCHEME FAVOURED IN GISBORNE. GISBORNE, January 2. A largely attended meeting of producers discussed the > Government meat pool. Mr Bridge, president of the Farmers’ Union, the chairman. Mr W. ,D. Lysnar, M.P., who was the principal moved a resolution approving of the Government scheme “os an earnest endeavour to combat the disadvantages of existing conditions and to relieve the present unwarranted meat slump.” An amendment favouring the local pool was defeated, end the motion carried.