“DIRECT ACTION” BY FARMERS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26041, 3 January 1946, Page 6

“DIRECT ACTION” BY FARMERS

Sir, —Your correspondent Mr J. S. Elliot is well aware that no facilities exist for consulting files of daily or other newssheets in this disfrict. And whether Mr Mulholland used the words “ direct action ” or not. his whole policy and agritation tended In that direction and could have no other object. This is clearly shown by the expressions of opinion of the Farmers' Union members in the north and the plan of campaign announced a few days ago, which put Mr Mulholland into full retreat from the impasse he assisted to create. What I wrote on the subject I still maintain is the fact pure and simple. Your correspondent suggests that I was “ indignant ’’ when I wrote of ” intolerant bigotry,” ” disordered, class-biased imagination," and “ irresponsible political partisans,” and hastens to declare he could not lower himself to that kind of debate. Such a sudden reform of his propaganda method would be welcome, but I am dubious of its permanency. For when I wrote those words I had in mind the verbiage of many vicious attacks on organised trade unionists, their work, and their policy —of which he has not the slightest knowledge—not being one and “ not accepting newspaper reports.” We have had three Ministers of Agriculture appointed by the present Government, and every one of them has been a practical and, I understand, successful working farmer. They have been virulently attacked on the most paltry pretexts, and they and their colleagues accused of “ hostility to the farmers.” Hostility, indeed! It must: have been when the rabbiters’ earnings in winter were taxed 20s to pay for the killing of rabbits, whose increase was due to the landowners’ neglect to observe the obligations of his lease or tenure. Again, the unjust and vicious attack, made repeatedly on the Prime Minister in connection with the many millions of money given as a late subsidy or payment by the British Government. Mr Fraser and his colleagues were practically charged with depriving the farmers of their just rights, etc., and, despite the fullest assurance by their own representatives on the Meat and Dairy Boards and a special committee of inquiry that the moneys in question did not belong to the farmers, the silly accusation is still sent circulating through the country, but never a word of apology for the direct Insults and vicious inuendoes used by these very, very cultivated writers and speakers—the very same folk who write of their unwillingness to indulge in debate of “ a low level.” How lofty the sentiment! . , ... As this letter is, I think, already too long, your correspondent’s desire for my opinion concerning unionism (it has been known here for 50 years) must wait for a future date.—l am, etc., W. D. Mason. Middlemarch, December 28.