WHAT IS CONTROL WITHOUT COMPULSION ?

Southland Times, Issue 20203, 14 June 1927, Page 5

WHAT IS CONTROL WITHOUT COMPULSION ?

To the Editor. Sir, —During the past few months, while the control controversy has been raging, you have on different occasions taken pains to make it quite clear that your opposition was not to “Control” but to “Compulsory Control.” Might I, therefore, appeal to you, Sir, or to Mr. Timpany, with whom you generally see eye to eye on control matters, to explain exactly just what you mean by ‘Tree Control” or “Control without Compulsion.” I delayed writing this in the hope of gaining enlightment from Mr Timpany’s speech at Mataura but was doomed to disappointment. Mr. Timpany’s address consists in the main of a reiteration of the same old hash we have been treated to for the past six months. True, he takes time to pay a glowing tribute to the Press of Southland (he would be very ungrateful if he did not) to hand out a little judicious flattery to the Southland factory managers, and even to bestow a pat on the back to the Control Board for a few things they have done with his approval. He finally makes an urgent appeal to the dairymen of Southland. What is the appeal? In effect it is simply this—“ Curtail our power as much as you like, take away our responsibility, but for the love o’ Mike don’t abolish the board.” The Control Board having been set up by the dairymen of New Zealand for the express purpose of marketing the whole of their produce, it was manifestly impossible for them to even attempt to do so unless they had the said produce under their control. I think it will be admitted, too, that it was quite impossible to got control of the produce without the compulsory clause. Therefore, it seems to me, Sir, that Free Control simply means No Control and I should like to know how you or Mr Timpany, or anybody else can be consistent while claiming to support control, and at the same time opposing the board’s taking such action as to make control possible. I am quite well aware, Sir, that a fairly large proportion of the produce had to be exempted, and this fact has been made use of to the utmost by the board’s opponents. This free produce has, I understand, proved a stumbling block to the board in its operations this season, and this serves to strengthen the argument that control without compulsion is no control at all. Coming to the next compulsory clause.— If A objects to the compulsory pooling of his produce, surely B is equally justified in entering an equally vigorous protest against the compulsory levy. If then you, or Mr Timpany, favour keeping the board in existence without compulsion, may I ask where are the necessary funds coming from? If the board is to depend on free contributions from the dairy companies, I am afraid ’ the members will very soon be paying their own travelling expenses. Coming back to Mr. Timpany’s Mataura speech. Mr Timpany claims great credit for the board for their work in connection with shipping, storage, advertising, insurance, etc. Now, Sir, has the Control Board done anything in these matters that could not have been done equally well, and at a fraction of the cost, by the dairy associations? If they have, is it not simply because they have had compulsory control of the goods, and assured finance from a compulsory i levy ? j As I have already stated, the Control Board was brought into existence chiefly

as a marketing board. If then, it has failed in this, and Mr Timpany seems quite positive that it has, how can he advocate the continuance of such a costly white elephant merely to attend to matters which can be handled quite as efficiently by our dairy associations?—l am, etc., FRANK R. CHRISTIE. Mat aura Island. [lf our correspondent reads the Act he will find that it contemplated the existence of a board without compulsory marketing. It is the Dairy Control Board we supported, not compulsory marketing. We think the board can do valuable work apart from the compulsory marketing clauses.—Ed. S.T.]