MINUTES OK EVIDENCE. 



6 August, 1919.] 



Sm HENRY REW, K.U.B. 



[Continued. 



but, again, we must take the total bill, and not a 

 percentage quantity. But I ani bound to say the 

 questions addressed to me were, I think, rather on 

 the assumption that the quantities would be normal. 



754. I am asking you now, as the Statistical Officer 

 of the Board, whether that is not true? That is per- 

 fectly true, as you stated it. 



755. And the same position is true in the case of 

 feeding stuffs? Yes. 



756. Has it not also been established, and is true in 

 the case of feeding stuffs, that certain economies 

 could be made in the use of feeding stuffs, and that 

 beef, for instance, could be produced with less feed- 

 ing stuffs and more economically than before the war ? 

 Yes, I think that is so. 



757. And therefore that the profit would be greater? 

 I think I have finished one bogey. 



758. Are you conversant at all with Mr. Wilson 

 Fox's reports on wages and agricultural labour of 

 1899 and 1902? Yes; I read thorn at the time, and 

 have looked at them since. 



759. Do you remember the chart in which Mr. 

 Wilson Fox shows quite clearly that the cash wages 

 of agricultural labourers were rising steadily from 

 1875 to 1901, with the exception of a few years just 

 after 1880? I do not at the moment remember the 

 chart, but I think that is a true statement. 



760. Will you have prepared a precis of what Mr. 

 Wilson Fox has to say on that point? Certainly, if 

 the Commission desire it. That is to say, as to the 

 general rise in wages of agricultural labourers after 

 1871? 



761. Yes, from 1871 to 1901. Are you aware that 

 during that period, when the prices for farm produce 

 were falling, the prices of practically all the com- 

 modities which the labourer purchased were also fall- 

 ing? It follows, of course, in some cases? Yes. 



762. Would you agree, then, that even if cash wages 

 had not risen, the real wages of labour would have 

 risen during that period? By the general reduction 

 in the cost of living ? 



763. Yes? Yes. 



764. Turning to another point raised by Mr. 

 Cautley, the question of the supply of efficient farmers, 

 is it not true that a certain number of farm workers, 

 and also a certain number of country bred people, 

 obtained farms, or entered into the tenancy of farms, 

 during the period of depression, and that in some 

 cases those or their descendant* are now the most 

 efficient fanners? Yes. Of course, I have not any 

 definite instances in my mind; but I should say, as 

 a general proposition, it is true. 



70"). So that you think there is a possible supply of 

 more efficient farmers in the country areas, apart 

 from the race of present farmers? There is an 

 obvious source of supply of men who have been bred 

 and brought up on the land, and to a certain extent 

 trained in farming operations to take farms; but of 

 course I did not intend, in my previous answer, to 

 say that those were the only men who had weathered 

 the storm, nor I presume did you intend to convey, it. 



766. No. Is there not also another possible supply 

 of efficient farmers, or is there not a way of obtaining 

 efficient farmers and an increase of the size of tho 

 farms farmed by efficient farmers; that is to say, if 

 you increase the size of the farms, you require a 

 much smaller number of efficient farmers? Yes, that 

 is clear. 



767. And therefore if we want to increase the 

 number of efficient farmers, we are not at all depen- 

 dent on tho supply of townsmen? Yes, I think 

 generally that is so. Of course it is all a question of 

 decree of actual numbers. Thai there are sources 

 of recruitment for the race of farmers at present 

 existing, I agree ; but all I said was, that you could 

 not contemplate sweeping away the present race of 

 farmers and replace them at once. 



7i. J . It has been suggested that the landlords, 

 ruUirr anticipating benefits to be obtained under the 

 guarantees, are gelling their land, because they are 



25125 



afraid of the future. Is it not also true that there is 

 an equal or greater number of people willing to come 

 forward to purchase land at enhanced prices? There 

 must, at least, be an equal number, or else there 

 would be no sale. 



769. Have you any opinion as to whether these are 

 wise or foolish persons ? 



770. Chairman : I do not think you should ask 

 that? I do not think I can express an opinion as to 

 that. 



771. Mr. Ashby: Turning now to the question of 

 foreign supplies, is it not true that before the war 

 certain changes were occurring in the sources of 

 supply of wheat ; that is to say, that whereas 20 years 

 ago we were receiving much the greatest part of our 

 imported wheat supplies from the United States and 

 Canada, the proportion received from the Argentine 

 and Australia* was growing in the ten years before 

 the war? Yes; I should think that the proportion 

 received from the Argentine was growing. I am not 

 quite clear about Australia. Australia, of course, 

 before the war, was always a very uncertain supplier. 

 Occasionally she was not an exporter at all. It so 

 happened in the first year of the war she was not. 



772. But is it true that, on the whole, the supplies 

 of wheat imported into this country before the war 

 were carried a considerably longer distance by sea 

 than those imported 20 years ago ? Yes, that is true. 

 The average length of distance which the wheat was 

 brought was certainly increased. 



773. And the average cost of freight, irrespective 

 of freight rates, was also greater because of distance? 

 Of course, during that same period, while, owing 

 to the alterations to some extent in the sources of 

 supply, the average length of haul was increased, 

 there was, for other reasons, a tendency for freights 

 to fall. 



774. I agree up to about 1907; but beyond that 

 date, I think you will find they were rising? You 

 may be right. 



775. Is it not a fact that, say, five years before the 

 war, the shortage of what arc known as visible sup- 

 plies of wheat was becoming a serious matter for the 

 whole of the wheat consuming populations of the 

 world? No, I do not think I agree. 



776. Would you agree that about, say, the end of 

 lest century there was at any given time something 

 like six months' visible supply, and that in two or 

 three years before the war the visible supply was 

 never greater than two months? I should think that 

 is likely. I do not remember it in those terms ; but the 

 fact that supplies were keeping up quite adequately 

 to demand is shown by the prices. 



777. Adequate to the demand, I admit; but not 

 showing such a surplus over the necessary amount 

 as was the case ten years previously? That merely 

 meant the perfecting of the means of transit and 

 distribution. The more you perfect the means of 

 distribution and it applies all over the world as well 

 as in this country the less stocks you need carry. 

 You could run this country, and it was ran before 

 the war, on a four weeks' supply of wheat, quite 

 easily, because the distribution was as nearly perfect 

 as things can be. You run a considerable risk now in 

 running it on eight weeks' stocks. 



778. I admit all the improvements in the organ- 

 isation of the market and the means, of transport; 

 but I suggest to you that is not the sole explanation 

 of the difference. The difference is, that tho amount 

 produced was not keeping pace with the increase 

 in the consumption of wheat? I do not agree. Tho 

 increase of wheat and the supply of wheat under 

 the free conditions which existed, and, as I say, 

 with tho perfection of tho means of transit, year 

 in and year out, the supply would keep pace with 

 the demand, and there was no risk it was not going 

 to do so. Of course, there was always a theoretical 

 risk that any particular crop in one year might 

 fail everywhere, in which case we should have gone 

 uncommonly short. That still remains, and will always 

 remain a theoretical possibility. But for that, the 



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