HoYAI. COMMISSION ON A<;Hirri/n KK. 



, 1919.] 



SIR RiriURii WINFREY, M.P. 



[G 



.Summary <</ I'ntfitt. 



1913. 

 s. d. 

 1st year-wheat .. 



3dytar- mangolds 



3rd year-barley 130 



4th year- hay seeds 



1919. 

 . d. 

 1 7 3 

 9 16 

 6 19 6 

 13 15 6 



Average profit per acre 



4)13 1 4)34 17 3 

 300 644 



(This eonelvdrs the evidrnrr-in*hirf.) 

 7979 Dr Douglas: I am only going to ask certain 

 Kenorai questions. I will leave tho question of the 

 cost of operations, and so on, to those who arc raor. 

 familiar with your district. You are a stronu 

 believer in the productive value of small holdings, a 

 you not!" 1 am. 



7980. You consider the production per man c 

 small holding higher than is th.- rnso on n large hold- 

 ingCertainly. 



7981. Do you think the labour is superior?--! do. 

 Shall I particularise? 



7982. By all means? On one of these estates that 

 1 am Chairman of, where we have 1,000 acres of 

 Crown land, that was previously occupied by one 

 farmer who employed ten regular labourers; he had 

 ten cottages and a small amount of casual labour. 

 We now have 39 families getting a good living off 

 that estate in addition to some of the land which \- 

 let in allotments to those living around the district. 



7983. Yes, but my question wax, and I think yon 

 answered it in the" ami-mat ive, whether you thought 

 that the labour per man was more productrro on small 

 holdings than on large holdings? I do, because they 

 work longer and they work harder. 



7984. So that the cost of production so far as labour 

 is concerned would be greater on large holdings than 

 on small ones? Quite. 



7985. You think labour is more efficient on the 

 small holdings? I do. 



7986. Will you please tell us exactly how these 

 statements are arrived at in the second and third 

 sub-paragraphs of your paragraph 4. You say: In 

 reckoning the profits it must of course be remembered 

 that each small holder is charging for his own labour 

 at current rates, and this applies to the wife and 

 other members of the family? Yes. 



7987. Does that mean that an account was kept at 

 the time and all the labour charged at these rates 

 _ I sat down with this man and be told me that he 

 had kept the cost of his own labour, and these were 

 the charges which he also made when ho assisted his 

 neighbours. 



7988. He kept these accounts at the time? He did. 



7989. Have you got the figures of the rate charged 

 for labour? The rate charged in 1913 was 3s. a day 

 for himself. 



7990. For how long a day? 1 could not say that. 



7991. It is an important point, is it not!- This was 

 in 1913 and I could not say. 



7992. Do you know what it was in 1919? In 19111 

 the charge was 7s. a day. 



7999. Have you any record of the length of that 7s. 

 day? I think' I am fight in saying it was from 7 a.m. 

 to 5 p.m. with an hour and a half for meal times. 



7994. That is 8J hours? Yes, and no half holida-v mi 

 Saturday there not at present. Then the wife's 

 wages were 2s. a day in 191.1 and in 1919 5s. a day. 



7996. The day bemg of similar length ? Yes. 



7996. Bo that that works out for a man about lOd. 

 an hour? Yea, it is upon that basis that these figures 

 are computed. 



7997. And for woman about 7d.? Yes. 



7998. When overtime was worked no special charge 

 was made? No. 



7999. To go down to the next paragraph, potatoes. 

 th- charge for farmyard manure is for 13 loads out of 

 the ynrd. 3, that is 6s. a load in 1019? Yes. 



8000. Is that the normal price at the present 

 moment? I put it to them, and they thought that 

 WM a fair price, and that is exactly the same price an 

 th' small holder thought it was valued at in Norfolk. 

 I saw him next day without telling him what the 

 Lincolnshire man had said, and he put the same value 

 pn it fa. a load. 



8001. Do you think that Ls the actual value of it 

 either 111 relation to uurcha- <! nmnuivs or in relation 

 to market prices? Yea, I think go. 



-m-_> On what basis is your interest on capital 

 charged:- You do not charge an o\er!ica.l n 

 on the holding; ><>u charge ililleivnt rate* for dill. 

 crops? I took the potato crop that was of course m\ 

 on working out as costing li !. lid. to produce, 

 and I took the interest on that practically a little 

 and I did the same with the other. 



8003. In paragraph (7) you give without working u 

 out in detail the cost "t the third year oat crop follow- 

 ing wheat? Yea. 



8004. Is that a fairly normal order of cropping in 

 the district?- It is in beeping Ken. 



8005. You say it is the same charges a* for wheat? 

 Yes 



8006. What is the wheat figure now, after the 

 i ,.i reotion you gave us this morning?- The correction 

 was with regard to the Norfolk figures: you are now 

 on the Lincolnshire figures. 



8007. Then Nos. 6 and 7 are correct? ies. 

 The wheat charge in paragraph (4) 



13 17s. 2d., to which you add 4 4s. 6d., being the 

 first four items in the potato crop? Yes. 



8009. To that you add 3 for dung? Yes. 



8010. Making per acre of oats 21 Is. 8d., less 

 variation in the price of seeds. What is that varia- 

 tion? Does your oat seeding cost less than 25s. an 



- a little less than the wheat. t 



8011. Does it cost leas than 25s. an acre? What do 

 we put in for wheat? 



8012. 25s. I am talking of 1919? Yes, 1 5s. 

 could not say what would he exactly the difference 

 between the seeding of an acre of oats and the seeding 

 of an acre of wheat. 



8013. I put it to you it would at all events not be 

 >ian I'".-., and it would probably lie a good deal 



more. Seed oats would need to be reckoned, would 

 they not, at somewhere not less than 8s. a bushel. The 

 controlled price for feeding oats was 6s. a bushel, 

 and seed oats would lie higher than that? 

 think vou are right. 



8014.' Seeding oats would be substantially more than 

 that. Kour bushels would bo low seeding for oats, 

 would it not? These men buy their seeds from one 

 another ns a rule: they do not go and buy the best 

 seed. 



-ill.-, Do they take less than market price from one 

 another 'r No. 'they take the 6s.; I think that would 

 IM- a fair price. 



8016. That would bring it out at Is. less if you had 

 only four bushels to the- acre, which I think you 

 would agree would be a low seeding ?- Yes ; that would 

 bo tl 4s. 



8017 There is a reduction of Is. on that, and tho 

 total cost of oats is therefore 21 Os. 8d? Yes. That 

 is the m-t expensive crop of the year, because it i 

 then followed by the wheat crop. 



8018. If that 'crop is to stand bv itself, and if you 

 indicate a separate profit on each crop, it means a 

 very high cost of production, does it not? It does. 



H019. Have von stated the yield of oats at all? 

 No. T have not done that. 1 nm afraid I did not go 

 into the oat crop as thoroughly as I went into the 

 potatoes and wheat. 



8020. T am just taking the figures that you have 

 given us? -Yes. quite 



8021. The next crop that you give is a crop of 

 grass land laid down for hay in 1919? Yes. 



8022. When was that laid down when was it sown? 

 It was permanent grass. 



'. Then it was not laid down- No. it should 

 have been " One acre of permanent grass laid down 

 for hay.." 



8024. Had that no manuring, except 5 cwt. of basic 

 That is 80. 



8025. No dung? No. 

 R020. No nitrogen? No. 



8027. This vield is very high for a crop which has 

 had practically no manure* That is tho estimate he 

 has made. 



8028. Has that estimate been oho< kcd'- -No. 

 saw the hay stack : he mowed .1 acres and he reckons 

 he has got 4 J tons. 



. t See Appendix No. IV. 



