Milling Industry.

Progress, Volume XIV, Issue 12, 1 August 1919, Page 576

Milling Industry.

The New Regulations.

Commissioner oS Forestry Criticised.

A representative of the West Coast sawmilling- organisation, states that a recent article of the “Post” (commenting on the objections of the Westland County Council to the forestry policy of the Government) has been quoted in the “Greymouth Evening Star” and other papers. Therefore the. “Post” has been requested to grant space for the following

explanation of the position of the milling industry in some districts, as affected by the new regulations:

“ Restriction of Industry,”

“The objections of the Westland County Council, as stated in the Post, were on three main grounds. With objection No. 1, Restriction of Settlement, and objection No. 3 Reduction of Revenue, the sawmillers are not concerned; but in the matter of objection No. 2 Restriction, of Industry, they are vitally interested. It was only when Sir P. D. Bell visited the district (in the West Coast) the other day that he disclosed the full extent of his designs to strangle the milling industry; and it may be said at once that the sawmillers cannot believe that the policy of confiscation so brazenly advocated by the Commissioner of Forests at Hokitika is the considered policy of the Government.

“The Minister stated in the plainest terms that any fresh grant of a sawmill license, whether in exchange for a certificate of reservation or otherwise, would carry a condition absolutely prohibiting the export of rirnu beyond the Dominion. To understand what this amounts to, one must explain the conditions on which milling bush is held under the Warden’s Court, nearly all the milling bush being in mining districts, and held under this tenure. A sawmiller, on application, is granted a sawmill license up to 400 acres. On this he pays an annua! rent of Is per acre, merging in the royalty when he commences operations. He can also have reserved for him, on payment of an annual rent of Is per acre (not merging in royalty), areas, not exceeding 400 acres each, up to a total of 1600 acres. When his sawmill license is cut out, he can exchange the title of one of these reserved areas for a sawmill license, and may take up a fresh reserved area, if such is available. It will be seen that the total maximum area which the miller may hold at any one time is 2000 acres, including the reserved areas.

Cost of Plant. "Now, whatever the legal position may be, it has always been taken for granted that the miller possessed a right to convert his reserved areas in succession into" sawmill licenses, without any new conditions attaching other than a possible increase of royalty. The reason for this assumption is evident. No prudent man would enter into the difficult and uncertain business of sawmilling unless he had in sight, as the very first condition, enough bush to ensure for his mill a life long enough to provide for the necessary sinking fund on his capital expenditure, and a reasonable interest return. The average present-day mill on the West Coast, buiU on the strength of a 2000- acre holding, at pre-war prices, costs from £2500 to £3OOO to erect and equip. The mill-owner who can work his bush with a tram anything less than eight miles in length is lucky, and the average is more than this. But at eight miles the tramway cost, at pre-war prices, £I2OO a mile, or, say, £IO,OOO. This is a total expenditure of £13,000 for an average mill.. These figures arc

only mentioned in order to demonstrate that it has been universally assumed that the miller had a good title to both his sawmill license and reserved areas; otherwise no sane man would incur such a' expenditure to work a bush of 400 acres, giving him perhaps three years’ work.

Question of Export.

“Before dealing with the effect of the Minister’s intended action, we may consider the question of export. There is good ground for claiming that if the Minister’s proposals were equitable when applied to other parts of the Dominion, which we deny, they should not be enforced on the West Coast. The export trade to Australia in rimu had its origin in the Greymouth-Hokitika district, and large suras were spent in introducing the timber to Australia, some eight or ten years ago. In those days the West Coast sawmiller was tolerated, and found employment for labour and capital by shipping to Australia when the Dominion market failed to absorb the output. He was still tolerated in the earlier part of the war period, AAhen he found loading for steamers which would otherwise have gone empty to Australia, and kept his mills running in spite cl the stagnation in the Dominion timber trade. But towards the end of the war period prices in Australia began to rise, and other sawmilling, districts began to seek the Australian business to the neglect of their natural markets. The West Coast millers never failed to supply their home markets Wellington and Christchurch, so far as tonnage Avar available, and any shortage r hich exists or has existed in these centres is due, so far as the West Coast is concerned, to lack of tonnage only. The outcry raised by the builders and buttermen over the alleged shortage of timber, ultimately led to the restrictions on export which haA r e been in force for the last year or so. They r ere probably at no time necessary as applied to this part of the Dominion, but are being administered by the Board of Trade Avith complete satisfaction to West Coast millers.

“It was early recognised that the sawmill position here is totally different from that in most other parts of New Zealand, A\diere they have direct rail communication with their markets. It Avas seen that it was immaterial what source supplied the Dominion markets, so long as their demands were met; and the commonsense plan Avas adopted, in effect, of letting each district find its natural outlet, provided the Avants of the Dominion are first supplied. The Australian market is the second natural outlet for the West Coast, Canterbury being the first. At the moment, more steamers are available for the coastal trade than there have been for years, and there is some prospect off stocking up the yards in Canterbury. After this is done, there Avill be a reversion to the old order of things, Avhen it was necessary to send half the output to Australia. - '

Limitation of Output.

“But it is at this point that the Commissioner of Forests steps in and says that by the issue of a Gazette he will cut doAvn the production of every mill

by half, so soon as the miller has cut out his sawmill license and desires to acquire one of his reserved areas instead. The fact that this may happen to-morrow or three years hence does rot make the position any better. Indeed it makes the action of the Commissioner of Forests all thf more inexcusable and unjust, for it means closing up one mill to-morrow, while another may have three years’ unrestricted run. Further, it will operate directly in the interests of the miller-freeholder, who will not be interfered with, while the man on Crown land will be squeezed out. It is incredible that such an undemocratic reactionary policy can be indorsed by the men who form the National Government. “The cynical indifference with which the Minister regards the extinction of a man’s means of living is a revelation,” the statement concludes. 4 He said in so many words at Hokitika, that, if the Dominion trade was not enough to keep all the mills going, the number of mills must be reduced. It med hardly be asked which would be the first to go under, the big men or the little. We have dealt only with the outrageous injustice which the Minister proposes to perpetrate, # and have not touched on his ridiculous theories as to ‘demarcation, regeneration,’ and so forth. Perhaps we' may be llowed at a later date to say something about the hare-brained schemes of his forestry advisers.