RISING COSTS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 January 1941, Page 6

RISING COSTS

o BURDEN ON FARMING INDUSTRY INCREASE IN TRANSPORT CHARGES. MR. J. C. COOPER'S SURVEY. "It is lime farmers squeaked and : squeaked hard," said Mr. J. C. Cooper, I when speaking at a meeting of the [ Wairarapa Provincial Executive of the) Farmers’ Union today, Mr. Cooper i was referring to increased costs, in- I eluding transport, imposed on the farming community. Mr. Cooper, giving a review of oper- [ ating costs in the No. 2 Transport Licensing District, said it was based on the returns of 42 operators throughout the district, of which .six were in the Wairarapa. In 1937-38 the 42 operators used 167 vehicles and in the 1939-40 200 vehicles. In 1939-40 the average fig-’ ures per vehicle for gross revenue, [ wages and drawings' in lieu of wages! and profit were: Average gross revenue j per vehicle, £878; average wages and i drawings in lieu of wages per vehicle! £282; average profit per vehicle £106; [ number of vehicles per operator 4.76. i In 1939-40, these figures represented i 12.1 per cent profit per vehicle and the' net profit per operator was £504. and! two years previously had been £589. ■ Mr. Cooper went on to state that ve- j hides were written off in eight years. I and from a capital investment of about! £l5OO. the profit made last year was! £504. He did not want to say that! that was excessive —some sections ofj organised labour received more than i that, such as wharf and freezing works j workers —but he considered they were.! doing very well if they were making! somewhere about 33 1-3 per cent profit I on such a capital outlay. Farmers had [ to pay the lot and many of them were! the worst paid men in the country, j Some had a hard job to pay only inter-j est on their capital. Every increase! which the Licensing Auhtority or the; Arbitration Court gave was a cut in the ■ living wage of the farmer, It was’ about time, he said, that farmers! squeaked and squeaked hard and let the public know what they were up against. He could remember when ; politicians had said that the ideal State would have incomes evenly distributed. but today the income of the country was being over-distributed and the 1 people engaged in primary production * wore getting the worst end of the stick, i The position of the sheep farmer had; been worse than that of the dairy [ farmer in the last few years, Mr. Hugh Morrison agreed that, transport charges vs-rv going up.i which affected farming costs, especially i those in the back country. It was no-' pessary to have the fullest co-operation [ m transport mailers, and the Union' was much obliged to Mr. Cooper fori, the amount of work he had put into! that matter. Reference was made by Mr. it W. Kebbell to the wonderful job the rail-. ways had made in shifting furniture! from the Hutt to his home. If he had been able to get a lorry it would have! cost £l2 Ills. plus packing, whereas : the railways had packed it, insured it and delivered the furniture for £7 id/. The job, he said, had been wonderfully done.