FARMERS’ DIFFICULTIES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23858, 12 July 1939, Page 5

FARMERS’ DIFFICULTIES

VO THE EDITOR Sir,— Though to-day much ado is made about the state of the sheep farming industry, yet for years the sheep farmer has only in rare instances been the person of substance and independence that he* so often would have the rest of the community believe him to be. Thanks to freeholding, and with it the malignant spread of the mortgage system, to purchase a sheep farm or run as a paying concern is like a runner entering a race with his ankles loaded with the shackles and ball-weight of the convict. ' The productive value of his land has long since been forgotten, the land has become a name associated with a bunch of mongages, raised and transferred in a manner worthy of a stock exchange. The pitiful story of increased costs—the wail of the Farmers’ Union—ig so flimsy and unconvincing, alongside of the burden of mortgage interest as to-make its advocates ridiculous. Many of us know to our cost the evils of free and legalised abuse of the powers ot finance by stock firms and commercial institutions. Out of a seed-time of falsehoods, misrepresentation of land ' values, financial spoliation, and unjust and malicious methods that have caused the eviction or heart-break of many affine farmer, to-day those same concerns reap the whirlwind in the difficulties of their sheep farmer clients.-* Do not let the farmer be deceived by the trail of the herring—rising costs—drawn across by his false friends. The evil is a far more serious and dangerous one than the-paltry wages of the workers. For some time I have been preparing a comprehensive report of the methods used by certain stock agents, the abuse, victimisation, and ruination of farmer friends by them. I hope shortly to present this report to the Government. ' But-before I complete it, further reports from farmers would be most welcome. It is all in the interests of a justice long overdue.—l am, etc,, J. B. Birtles. Quarantine Island. Port Chalmers, f July 10.