MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



89 



2 Septembtr, 1919.] 



MR. CASTELL WREY. 



[Continued. 



it is very serious, especially in the tricky harvest 

 we have been having, with so .many wet days this 

 season. 



7880. I suggest to you the number of individual 

 cases you have quoted are not very serious compared 

 with the great body of workers? They are out of 

 all proportion to the number I could produce. 



7881. Would it not be possible to find similar cases 

 before the war? Before the war one did not hear 

 such general growling about it by the farmers as one 

 hears now. 



7882. Would that be due to the fact that they were 

 paying such inadequate wages that farmers had no 

 right to expect a great amount of efficiency from 

 their workers? I cannot answer as to that. 



7883. That would be the tendency, would it not, 

 that with the abnormally low wages they were pay- 

 ing their workers they would not care to check their 

 men very much, and would not expect a very high 

 standard of efficiency? I do not think that neces- 

 sarily follows. 



7884. You quote one case where a man is a member 

 of the Agricultural Workers' Union? Yes. 



7885. You do not suggest, do yon, that the way 

 that man acted would be endorsed by his Union 

 that such conduct is any part of the Union policy? 

 No, certainly not. 



7886. Mr. Lennard : Would you agree that these 

 examples of bad workmen which you have quoted to 

 us do not in themselves show deterioration in the 

 efficiency of labour, unless you can also produce 

 proof that there were fewer cases of that sort in 

 previous days? As I answered Mr. Smith just now, 

 one did not hear these constant grumblings on the 

 part of farmers in pre-war days. Wherever you go 

 now farmers are grumbling about the way labour is 

 working. 



7887. You were not in England just before the war, 

 were you? Yes. 



7888. Mr. Langford : You have read to us a letter 

 from a farmer who has bought his farm? Yes. 



7889. In which he complains that in consequence 

 of purchasing his farm the interest on the money that 

 he has so invested will amount to more than the 

 rental he previously paid? No, he does not say 

 anything of the sort. 



7890. He said he would be much worse off? He 

 said he would be worse off. 



7891. Is not the implication that he will be worse 

 off in the sense that he will have to pay more in the 

 shape of rent than he did before? I cannot tell you 

 what the implication is; I can only tell you what he 

 says in his letter. 



7892. What construction do you put upon it? That 

 he will be worse off. He will have to pay Income Tax 

 under three schedules and he will have to keep his 

 buildings in repair and insure them. Those are three 

 items of expenditure that he would not have to pay 

 as a tenant farmer. 



7893. Will not that amount to a big increase in the 

 rental? It will, of course, if you put it on a rental 

 basis. 



7894. It is within your knowledge, I suppose, that 

 a great number of farmers are buying their farms? 

 Yes. 



7895. In their words the landlords are taking 

 advantage of war prices to sell out their farms? No, 

 I think the reason is that landlords have been hit 

 so severely by the cost of labour and the interest 

 they have received on their landed property has been 

 so very minute that they are compelled to sell their 

 land and put their money into investments which will 

 bring them in four or five per cent, instead of the 

 two or two and a-half they have got in the past. 



7896. You know that very little repairs have been 

 done to the houses and buildings during the war? 

 Yes, very little. 



7897. If that is so how could landlords have been 

 hit with regard to labour? Where they have em- 

 ployed gardeners or footmen or other servants the 

 cost of everything has gone up, clothes, livery and 

 everything. 



7898. Are you aware that a gardener need not be 

 paid the minimum rate of wages? Yes. 



7899. Is it within your knowledge that many 

 gardeners are paid as low as 20s. a week and have 

 to pay rental out of that? No, I pay all the 

 gardeners the minimum wage 36s. 6d. 



7900. Mr. Thomas Henderson: How many of these 

 cases are on your own farm? Two 



7901. Two out of the 58 labourers you employ? 

 Yes. 



7902. You seriously put that forward as evidence 

 that labour is deteriorating?. Yes. 



7903. Two cases out of 58? Yes. 



7904. Had you any similar cases before the war in 

 England? No. 



7905. Would it surprise you to know that farmers 

 have been making these complaints for years before 

 the war? No. I learnt that from Mr. Green on the 

 last occasion. 



7906. Do you not think that it would be possible to 

 find similar cases before the war? Yes, if we looked 

 for them, possibly. 



7907. With regard to what Mr. Smith put to you 

 about the men being unwilling to work and objecting 

 to work with a slacker does not that rather counteract 

 yours views at all ? I think I have answered that 

 question already. 



7908. To what extent does it counteract your views. 

 Does it not have any bearing on the problem at all ? 

 Very little, I think. 



7909. Mr. Green: I daresay you know that during 

 the 'eighties thousands of farmers were complaining 

 about the deterioration of labour, and they put it all 

 down to Mr. Joseph Arch. I suppose to-day they put 

 it down to the trade unions. At any rate, it has 

 been quite a common complaint from time imme- 

 morial ? Yes. 



7910. Mr. Edwards: Have you any reason to think 

 that the war has affected the efficiency of the agricul- 

 tural labourer more than it has affected the efficiency 

 of labourers in other spheres of work? I am afraid 

 the whole of my time is connected with agriculture, 

 and I get no chance of comparing them. 



7911. In order to be fair to the agricultural labourer 

 I presume you will admit that the five years of war 

 which we have gone through has been an absolutely 

 abnormal period and has affected the frame of mind 

 of the people throughout the whole country the 

 agricultural labourer, the farmer and all other 

 labourers? We are talking about labour, are we not? 



7912. Yes, but I want your opinion as to whether 

 the abnormal times through which we have gone do not 

 in some way account for the inefficiency on the part 

 of labour to which you have referred? I think Mr. 

 Smith put me through that question the other day 

 very fully. 



7913. What was the reply you gave to Mr. Smith? 

 I cannot remember now, it is in the printed evidence. 



7914. Very well, we will leave it at that. With 

 reference to the farmer, Mr. Tate, who wrote you 

 the letter with regard to buying his farm, assuming 

 for the moment that he expresses the feelings of other 

 farmers with regard to the state of affairs after they 

 have bought their farms, what effect do you think 

 that will have on production in future? A very bad 

 effect. I think they will farm the farms as long as 

 their capital holds out and after that the land will 

 gradually deteriorate and then they will clear out and 

 somebody will have the expense of cleaning the land 

 up again and bringing it back into a proper state of 

 cultivation. 



7915. Do you think it will affect the amount of 

 arable and grass? As soon as the grass seed gets 

 reasonable in price a tremendous lot of arable land 

 will go down to grass, I think. 



7916. Mr. Duncan : Most of the instances you have 

 just read to us are with reference to young men, are 

 they not? Yes, I think that is so. 



7917. What has been the experience in your district 

 as to the comparative increase in the wages of young 

 men as compared with those of the older men? I do 

 not quite follow your question. 



7918. Have the wages of young men increased to a 

 greater extent than those the older men have been 



getting? They have got the increase of wages which 



has been set up by the Wages Board. 



