MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



159 



20 August, 1919.] 



MR. CASTELL WREY. 



[Continued. 



4011. Do you think it would do most to stimulate 

 greater efficiency and good methods, if we had a low 

 guarantee with a free market for the farmer when- 

 ever the world's prices ruled higher than the guaran- 

 tee, which they probably would if the guarantee was 

 low, or if there was a higher fixed price, or alterna- 

 tively, if there was a fairly low guaranteed minimum 

 with another price named as a maximum? I do not 

 think any of those would tend to greater efficiency. 

 It might tend to a greater area of wheat. 



4012. Do you think either of those would impair 

 efficiency? I think very possibly it would have that 

 tendency. 



4013. Is it your experience that a good many 

 farmers when faced with the present day problem of 

 increased wages, tend to meet it not by getting 

 better horses and better machinery so that the day's 

 work of the man can be improved in quality and 

 output, but rather by short-sighted economies in try- 

 ing to cut down expenses in other directions? Yes, 

 I think that is very prevalent. 



4014. Do "you think it would be a good thing if 

 those smaller farmers who are unable for want of 

 capital or incapable for want of enterprise and 

 farsightedness of the better policy of working at the 

 quality of their machinery, horses, and so on to meet 

 the increased labour cost, not only contracted their 

 expenses but also contracted their acreage and became 

 small holders? I am not a believer in Small holdings 

 at all. They are most uneconomical, I think. 



. 4015. I am speaking of a real small holding worked 

 liy a man and his family? That is the only real possi- 

 ble way of working a small holding; but as a rule they 

 have not sufficient capital to buy good implements. 



4016. Xo; but would not some of these men who 

 are now farming 250 to 300 acres with insufficient 

 'apital to farm as highly as labour costs would seem 

 to require, be really better off if they became small 

 holders through working the farm themselves?- Yi>>. 

 I think they would li". 



4017. And' do you think a sound corollary of that 

 movement of, wo will say, 250 acre farmers into small 

 holders, would be the amalgamation of a good deal of 

 Ihe residual area into larger farms!' I think the 

 1 irger the farm is, the better the possibilities of pay- 

 ing, and the better chance of a big output. 



4018. Up to what limit? I should like 10,000 acres 

 myself. 



4019. I suppose you would agree that if the number 

 of really large farms was increased, your supply of 

 really efficient farmers would go farther, because they 

 would have control over a larger area ? Yes, I think 

 they would. You would eliminate the bad farmer., 

 which is very necessary. 



4020. An increase in the size of farms, or should 

 I put it more precisely, an increase in really large 

 farms over 2,000 acres, would tend on the whole in 

 your opinion to increase the efficiency of farming 

 throughout the country? I do not think 2,000 acres 

 is a possible area at all. It is a most uneconomical 

 area. 



4021. You think it should be larger? Certainly 

 larger. It is too large for a small farm, and too small 

 for a large farm. You cannot employ the really good 

 type of machinery you want on a small farm, because 

 you would be over capitalised on machinery. 



4022. You mentioned a limit of 10,000 acres as the 

 maximum. What would you say was the minimum 

 size of a really economical farm which could employ 

 machinery to its greatest advantage? From 6,000 to 

 10,000 acres. 



4023. I pass now to your fifth paragraph, the trouble 

 with efficiency of labour. You spoke of it being a 

 difficulty, as under present conditions you have to pay 

 a skilled man the damp wages as you pay an unskilled 

 youth? YM. 



402-1. And if you paid the skilled man more, the 

 unskilled man would leave you if you did not pay him 

 the same? Yea. 



4025. Does not that suggest to you that unless the 

 wni^es of the unskilled youth are considerable, he finds 

 he en get better wages in some other industry? Yes; 

 hut on the whole I think the labourer is very conser- 

 vative and likes to stiek to his job. I do not find 

 innriv men. even if they leave me. drift into other 

 pntha of life. They go to another farmer, that is all. 



2r, 12.-, 



4026. But surely it is a very common experience to 

 find that young men of from 18 to 22 leave agriculture 

 for other employment? I believe it is; but not in my 

 immediate neighbourhood, I think. Of course, further 

 south in the county, at Kettering and Northampton, 

 where there are boot factories, 1 believe agricultural 

 youths and girls practically all go to the factory. 

 Thank goodness I am away from the factories. 



4027. In a district like that, you would agree that 

 if you are to retain the young men who have the 

 capacity and strength to become in the future efficient 

 farm labourers, it is necessary that they should have 

 a wage which to them should be sufficient inducement 

 not to fly away to other industries? Yes; but then 

 those districts penalise the purely agricultural dis- 

 tricts. The purely agricultural districts have not 

 always got the land. Take the farm I am farming 

 myself. If we get beyond a certain limit of wages, 

 it is much better to shut the farm down. The thing 

 is, which is the best for the nation ; to shut the farm 

 down or produce the corn we can produce for the 

 populace to eat. That is what it really resolves itself 

 into, I think. 



4028. In other words, you consider it is impossible 

 for agriculture to compete with other industries for 

 the supply of really efficient labour? Unless we have 

 a guaranteed price for our cereals, you see we are 

 under a disadvantage. The bootmaker or the bicycle 

 maker, before ever he sells a boot or a bicycle, gets 

 his costs and knows exactly what profit he is going 

 to make, and allows a margin for strikes or anything 

 else. He puts his article on the market, and is 

 assured of nis profit ; whereas we do not know what 

 wo are going to do until we have actually grown our 

 crops, and we may find we have lost money on them. 

 There can be no competition between agriculture and 

 the factories. The manufacturer knows his profit and 

 we do not know it. 



1029. Over a number of years you would have an 

 idea of the average cost of production? We know the 

 average production. On the farm I am managing, 

 our average production is 3-037 quarters per acre. 



4030. And the average cost? The average cost I do 

 not- know. 



4031. Over a number of years, say seven years, you 

 would? I could simply give you the cost of the 

 labour; that is all. 



4032. But you would know, would you not, how 

 one season differs from another as regards the extra 

 costs imposed by weather conditions? Not unless you 

 got your balance sheet out at the end of the year 

 when you have possibly lost money or made it. You 

 cannot tell till the finish. 



4033. But I am only suggesting if you take a suffi- 

 cient period, say, seven years, you get a fairly normal 

 cycle of seasons ? You may ; yes. 



" 4034. There would be greater evenness, would there 

 not, between the costs of two seven-year periods than 

 between the costs of two individual years? Certainly, 

 I agree. 



4035. With regard to this difficulty of paying a 

 really good labourer more than the unskilled man, 

 have you had much experience of piece work? Piece 

 work is practically dead. We cannot get the men to 

 do it. 



4036. Do you think that is because of an inherent 

 objection to piece work, or because they have had 

 experience in the past of piece rates which proved 

 unfavourable? I do not think so; because in the 

 old days, when we used to pay about ]8s. a week, we 

 used to put the piece work so that the man could 

 earn slightly more than the 18s. ]t was some encour- 

 iigeineiit to him ; if bo worV^rl ronllv bard b rt trot a 

 great deal more. The man to-day works out in his 

 mind : " I am getting 150 per cent, increase in wages. 

 I ought to get 150 per cent, in piece work " ; and he 

 is not content with 150, but he wants 250 per ceril, 

 which kills piece work. We cannot pay it. 



4037. Do you think that reluctance to do piece work 

 might disappear, or be less, if you had a system under 

 which a man worked piece work at rates which would 

 give him more than the minimum time rate and was 

 at the same time guaranteed a minimum time rate? 

 Yes; I should be quite prepared to do that, but the 

 men are not. They will not do that. I have no 

 pieee work done this year at^all. 



I 



