MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



41 



27 August, 1919.] 



MR. THOMAS C. GOODWIN. 



[Continued. 



6195. Can you tell us what the increase in wages has 

 been, either in actual figures or percentages? I have 

 not got the percentages, but in 1915 the average wage 

 would be about one guinea a week on the large farm 

 that I had in Shropshire. 



6196. Not more than that? No. 



6197. Would that be a cash wage carrying any 

 amount of extras? There are always extras, which 

 we do not count. 



6198. You would count them now? It was a cash 

 wage ; the extras were not counted. 



6199. Any extras that they obtained then would not 

 count as part of the wage? No. 



6200. They would at the present time, would they 

 not? Yes. I find that the waggoners on this farm 

 were getting 22s. a week then, and the workmen 19s. 

 On a farm like that the bulk of your work is done 

 piece-work, and an estimate like that is not a fair 

 basis to take it on, because their wages would increase 

 more than that. 



6201. On the 1915 figures? Yes. 



6202. Are the 191.t figures actual cost or an esti- 

 mated cost ? It is an estimated cost. 



6203. The cost of labour has uniformly increased, 

 has it not? That is to say, all classes of labour have 

 had a proportionate increase in their wages? Yes. 



6204. Ought that not to reflect a similar uniform 

 increase in the various operations? In what way do 

 you mean? 



6205. To take " Cultivating, twice," that has in- 

 creased 50 per cent? Yes. 



G206. It has gone up from 9s. to 15s.? Yes. 



6207. When you come to hoeing it has increased 

 from Is. to 4s.? On that farm in 1915, as I said 

 previously, the bulk of the work was done piecework. 

 To-day we cannot get the piece-work done, the men 

 do not want the piece-work. 



6208. Take your drilling, that has increased three 

 times ; that has gone from 5s. to 15s. ? Yes, and 

 where we used to get 3^ to 4 acres per day drilled 

 in 1915 in Shropshire, to-day we are practically getting 

 not 2 acres in some cases in Cheshire. 



6209. I cannot understand why your cultivating 

 should only increase from 9s. to I5s. while your 

 drilling increases from 5s. to 15s. I should have 

 thought that the same factors would operate in each 

 case, and the increase would be reflected in the same 

 way? Not at all; there are so many different cir- 

 cumstances to be taken into consideration the land 

 and the second time through of cultivating, and so 

 on. It makes a great deal of difference. A man 

 can do a great deal more of one job than he can of 

 another. 



6210. In so far as labour has varied, that varia- 

 tion would not apply specially just to one operation 

 and not to others? Of course not, but there is a 

 great deal of difference in the conditions under which 

 you are doing your work. There is, for example, 

 considerably greater difficulty now in getting men 

 to do the drilling work than there is in the case of the 

 cultivating work. It takes a more skilled man to do 

 the drilling, work, and for drilling we often give a 

 little extra on the farm for doing that work. 



6211. Carting and spreading is exactly double it 

 has risen from 1 10s. to 3? Yes. 



6212. When you come to " Soil up with plough," 

 that has increased three times from 6s. to 15s.? 

 Yes, that is on the same basis as the ridging. 



6213. Do you suggest that in these different opera- 

 tions in the actual cost some of them have only 

 doubled whereas others have increased three times? 

 Yes, I do. You cannot take the same basis all 

 through. These estimates are based upon the amount 

 of work that we actually find we can' get done by the 

 men at present, and the amount of work that was 

 done by the men in the other year. 



0214. I cannot understand why there should be such 

 a wide difference between the costs of the different 

 operations? It is owing to the different conditions 

 under which we do them and the particular work at 

 the time ; that accounts for it. 



621/>. In sr>mc <-a.ses it is double and in other cases 

 it i four times. It is rather remarkable? In 1915 

 I could get my swedes, for example, hoed twice over 



for- 9s. an acre, and the men would do well at it. 

 This last year we have been paying 2 an acre for 

 doing the same work once over, not twice, and I 

 have not based it on the 2. That is one of the 

 difficulties that farmers have to contend with. 



6216. Take Table No. 2 and compare it with Table 

 No. 1 in the same list of figures. In Table No. 2, 

 1915, you seem to have two items at the finish, lifting 

 and hodding and weighing and delivering at a com- 

 bined cost of 3 15s. ? Yes. 



6217. Those items seem to have increased three 

 times in 1919. It costs 16 10s. What is the explana- 

 tion of that? There is a note at the bottom which 

 explains some of it, but the explanation is that in 

 1915 that particular crop of potatoes was lifted at 

 3 15s. per acre at hand piece-work. The 2 covers 

 the cost of weighing, bagging and delivering. To-day 

 the potatoes we have to get with the potato getter, 

 and you will find one acre is got in a day with two 

 horses, one man and ten pickers. That accounts for 

 the cost of 6 for lifting and hodding. It says 

 sifting and hoeing in the print; that is a mistake, 

 it should be lifting and hodding. You have to riddle 

 the potatoes after that if you are going to keep 

 them and put them in the pit, and then you have the 

 bagging, weighing and delivering. If they are sold 

 off the field the three items are merged in one and 

 reduced to a cost of 10. 



6218. I take it it is possible for the 1915 methods 

 still to obtain, and does it not follow that the 1919 

 figures can under the same circumstances be reduced? 

 Yes, but where .are you going to get your potatoes 



. from in the spring if nobody keeps them? In one 

 case they are sold straight off the field in the autumn, 

 and in the other case the cost is shown if they are 

 kept till the spring. 



6219. My point is, if it is possible to weigh and 

 deliver straight away in 1915 it is also possible for 

 some of the potatoes to be dealt with in that way 

 now, and in making comparative tables we want to 

 be perfectly clear that everything is equal in the 

 comparison and that we ought not to have the low 

 cost in 1915 and all the higher figures put in in 1919 

 which might not obtain? You have a note there on 

 Table No. 1 that this cost may be reduced to 10 

 where the potatoes are sold off the field, making the 

 total 53 6s. 9d. 



6220. I see right t! rough on rave made the same 

 difference in rent? Yes. 



6221. I suppose that is ;.n actual figure? Yes, that 

 is an actual figure. 



6222. In regard to the last set of figures in Table No. 

 11, I see in the comparative figures you have at the 

 finish you have three operations in 1919 and only two 

 in 1915 ? Yes. That is accounted for by the fact that 

 in 1915 I grew 30 acres of mangolds there which were 

 pulled, loaded in the carts and hodded by my men 

 piece-work at 1 per acre, and the men got plenty of 

 money at it. To-day you could not get that work 

 done piece-work, or at anything like the price. It has 

 to be done day-work, and it will cost you according to 

 the estimate here, and you will be very fortunate if 

 you get it done under those conditions. 



6223. There is a wonderful difference between the 

 two ? I quite agree, but it is impossible to get it done 

 at any less in Cheshire to-day. 



(i224. Would you suggest that the figures for this 

 1919 farm would be the same in 1915 as you suggest 

 for the other farm? The difficulty is in comparing 

 the two farms? They might vary a little as they 

 always do in different districts, but not very much. 



6225. You put at the finish in Table No. 11 : " Less 

 manurial residue left for corn crop, 1 Is.," but in 

 1914 when manure was one-third of the value you 

 charge to the wheat crop, 1 15s.? That is rather a 

 special circumstance. That was grown on my 

 original farm at Henhull where the roots had been 

 specially dressed and more heavily manured and there 

 was more residue. 



6226. You have fairly heavy manure in 1919. You 

 have 20 tons to the acre of natural manure and then 

 you have your artificials. You have fairly substan- 

 tial manuring in 1919? Do you mean in the root 

 growing? 



