MEAT BOARD CRITICISED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27568, 9 December 1950, Page 8

MEAT BOARD CRITICISED

Proposed Purchase Of Company PA INVERCARGILL, Dec. 8. The right of the New Zealand Meat Board to enter into an alliance with Towers and Co., London, was challenged today by the Meat and Wool Section of the Southland branch of Federated Farmers. The section decided to recommend to the provincial executive that the Minister of Agriculture be approached by a deputation requesting that “ the Government prevent the Meat Board from proceeding with negotiations with five proprietary freezing companies for the purchase of Towers and Co. until such time as New Zealand producers are given the fullest particulars and have approved the proposal.” The section also suggested that a' legal opinion on the matter be obtained. It was reported at the meeting that the three Southland delegates to the Electoral College Committee had strongly opposed to the action, taken by the committee, and had all registered their votes against the proposal. Mr C. J. Speight said that the motion had been passed by 19 votes to 5. The committee had been given just a little more than an hour to discuss the matter, and the Southland delegates had been “very sore” about the whole procedure. They had actually stated at the meeting that “We have been gagged.’ Mr Speight said: “On the surface, it looks as though it is a tie-up with South Island companies to make the monopoly more concrete.” Farmers all over the country wanted a board which would give full protection to the rights of the. producers, said Mr I. Fraser. There was something in the saying that the hand that rocks the Meat Board is the hand of the United Freezing Companies of New Zealand. The farmers were just the chopping block. Discussing the legal side of the question, the senior vice-president of the Southland branch, Mr A. V. Hartley, said that in the original Act setting up the Meat Board there was nothing which conferred on the board the right to purchase property, plant or equipment. Recently, however, an amendment had been carried giving the board these powers, but there was nothing in the Act to allow the board to go into partnership, nor was there any section giving the board power to take shares. “It is difficult to fathom the action of the board in making overtures to Towers and C 0.,” Mr Hartley said. “I am afraid that if the board can get such an amendment put through the House then it may be just as easy for the board to get another amendment through giving it power to purchase the business. I maintain that the board cannot go ahead with this project until it ' obtains permission through the 'House, and it is up to Federated Farmers of Southland to see that this does not happen. If we could get the majority of New Zealand farmers to see our side of the argument then no Minister of Agriculture would go against us.”