MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



5 August, 1919.] 



SIR DANIEL HALL, K.C.B., F.E.S. 



[Continued. 



17. Or, at all events, that has not recently been 

 cultivated. Was that land left out of cultivation 

 because it was unprofitable to cultivate it? It was 

 considered, without doubt, unprofitable to cultivate 

 it. 



18. And therefore the production of crops on that 

 land would be more costly to the producer than 

 production from the land that has remained under 

 cultivation? Broadly speaking, that would be true. 

 There might have been mistakes. 



19. It might have been erroneously supposed to be 

 unprofitable? Yes; but, speaking broadly, it would 

 be true. 



20. Has that, on the whole, been borne out by the 

 experience of the war, in which a good deal of land 

 was brought under cultivation? It is very difficult 

 to decide. These war-time cultivations were often 

 carried out without reference to profit and loss. 



21. Prices were abnormal? Prices were abnormal, 

 and the length of time was too short. If you start 

 to break up a rough old pasture, you hardly know 

 from one year's results what are going to be the 

 permanent results. 



22. That is to say, you do not think we could yet 

 argue from the financial results so far obtained from 

 war cultivation, that the land brought under culti- 

 vation during the war would in itself be profitable 

 to cultivate? The rotation has not passed through, 

 and so on? No, we have not seen enough time yet 



23. You could not argue from it? No. 



24. You put it to us that the policy in view in the 

 Corn Production Act. and the policy that you ad- 

 vocate, is one of the general increase of cultivation 

 without strict regard to whether the crop produced 

 is always a corn crop or a crop of some other kind ; 

 that is" to say, it need not be a crop produced for 

 direct use as human food? Yes. 



25. So that from that point of view, the encour- 

 agement of greater tillage as a means to the general 

 conduct of a farm would bo just as consonant with 

 that policy as the production of grain for selling off 

 the farm? Yes. 



26. And that was the policy of the Corn Production 

 Act, was it? That was the intention: by adding 

 certain -Tops that you would inevitably produce on 

 the arable land, to give that arable land a security 

 that it had not before. 



27. All the guarantees of the Corn Production Act 

 applied to the selected crops, whether those crops 

 were grown for consumption on the farm or for 

 gale off it, did they not? Yes. 



28. That policy appears to have been abandoned 

 in the proposed amendment to the Corn Production 

 Act, and a further guarantee has been given.. I refer 

 to the guarantee thao was first given on November 

 20th of last year, regarding the prices of the 19151 

 cereal crop. In that case a differentiation is made 

 between what is sold off the farm and what is grown 

 for consumption on the farm. Is not that so? 

 The promise to which you refer was a war emer- 

 gency promise regarding the pri - "I ;i particular 

 crap. 



29. That promise, as first given, was understood by 

 those to whom it was given, to apply t<i the wlnl. I 

 the cereal crop produced, was it not? I can hardly 

 say what people understood by the promise. 



30. Have you become aware that the persons con- 

 cerned have represented that they did understand that 

 promise to apply to the whole crop? Are we dis- 

 ciising agricultural policy, or are we discussing the 

 Government promise of last November? 



:jl. I am trying t<i ascertain, in view of the Uilance 

 sheet of to-morrow, whether the policy now in view 

 is tin- sime which lia- hitherto l>eeii pursued. I do 

 not know whether that is relevant, but it seems to 

 Of course, if Sir Daniel Hall does not 

 wish to answer the question, I am not going to pn i 



2;\ 



it? I am willing to discuss the question to any 

 length ; but I do submit that the question of what 

 the Government promised last November with regard 

 to the purchase of this season's crop, and the way 

 they are trying to carry out that promise, is what I 

 might call a temporary individual occurrence which 

 has nothing to do with policy at large. It was a 

 question of an emergency promise, and had nothing 

 to do with tlie Corn Production Act. The Corn 

 Production Act has since been invoked to deal with it. 



32. My suggestion was that the principle which you 

 have described of encouraging equally production 

 for the purpose of the farm, and production tor sale 

 oti' the farm, has been departed from in this new line 

 of action; but I do not want to press the question 

 if you do not wish to deal with it? What I would 

 .say is this: the Government promised last November 

 to purchase it practically came to that the cereal 

 crops of this forthcoming harvest. For various 

 reasons that became administratively not impossible, 

 but at any rate very difficult; and a kind of modified 

 Corn Production Act method was invoked as a means 

 of carrying out that particular promise. 



33. Or part of the promise? You must really not 

 dispute that point with me, but with the Government. 



Vr. Douglas : If Sir Daniel Hall does not wish to 

 deal with that point I do not wish to press it. 



34. Mr. Kea : You say in paragraph 4 of your 

 evidence-in-chief : "On the other hand, if the 

 minimum rates should be such as the majority of 

 farmers cannot pay, it would be necessary for the 

 State to raise the guarantees." Do you contemplate 

 a fixed minimum wage with fluctuating guarantees 

 acording to the market prices and the other fat-tons 

 in the cost of production? No. What I had in my 

 mind was this. Supposing there was a general move- 

 ment throughout the country which raised the 

 minimum ,wage to a point at which farming could 

 not be conducted, it seems to me that would be a 

 reason for raising your guarantees. That would lie an 

 expensive production. You would have to take a 

 higher level, under those conditions, for your 

 guarantees. 



35. Yes; but would not the demand for the higher 

 wages probably be brought about by the higher cost 

 of food and the higher expense of living generally, 

 which would, of course, be an item in the cost of 

 production as it related to prices? Of course, 

 guarantee- under the Corn Production Act 

 do not affect the cost of food at all, either plus or 

 minus. For instance, wheat is sold in {he open 

 market at the world's prices. The extra remunera- 

 tion, if those world's prices were below the guarantees, 

 is paid directly from the Exchequer to the farmers. 

 It does not affect the market price of the wheat. 



36. No; but would you not in future expect that 

 the wages minimum would fluctuate more or less in 

 accordance ,with the cost of the grain produce and 

 oth<T things? With the cost of food, certainly. It 

 would be an item, it seems to me, upon which the 

 minimum wage depends. 



37. It would not be likely, for instance, that thu 

 price of wheat and other things should drop, and that 

 wages would rise. The Government would not con- 

 template such a position as that? Possibly; while the 

 minimum rate must rise if the cost of food rises, it 

 seems to me the minimum rate may also rise for other 

 reasons, apart from the cost of food. There may come 

 a point when the industry becomes unremunerative ; 

 and it will be for the State then to decide whether it 

 will keep it going by raising the guarantee or not. 



38. Have you considered whether there should be 

 any relation, say, in the shape of a sliding scale, or 

 something of that sort, between the wages and the 

 prices of production? I have never been able to see 

 any possibility of drawing up such a sliding scale. 



39. Mr. Anker Simmons: On the broad point of 

 policy I take it that what you would be desirous of 

 would be such a policy as would prevent a repetition 

 of the disasters to agricmlture such as took place 

 between 1879 and 1900? Yes. 



A 3 



