MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



63 



21 October, 1919.] 



MR. E. M. NUNNELEY. 



[Continued. 



tion to my income as some townspeople pay, and I do 

 not think that is fair. I did not expect to go into 

 this, but I am prepared to put certain figures before 

 you if you think it worth while to prove what I have 

 just said. 



15,257. Do you suggest that you pay six or seven or 

 eight or ten times more on your income as a farmer 

 than other people do for rates? Yes. 



15,259. That is a sort of statement which wants 

 verification in some way or other? Yes, I can verify 

 it. 



15.259. Chuirmun: I think you might, if you will 

 put in for the consideration of the Commission the 

 tigures you base your statement upon? Yes, I will 

 do that." Might 1 say that we had a deputation some 

 time ago to Mr. Lloyd George when he was Chancellor 

 of the Exchequer on the subject of rating, and we 

 laid the figures before him. 1 am quite prepared to 

 submit those figures to you now. 



15.260. If you would be so kind as to send them in, 

 and if any of the Commissioners wants to ask you 

 questions upon them, perhaps you will put yourself 

 at our disposal at a later period? Very good, Sir. 

 Might I give one very short illustration of what I 

 mean? It will not take two minutes. 



15.261. Please? For the last 40 years I have been 

 occupying land at Orlingbury, four or five miles out 

 of Wellingborough. There were five parislies, for 

 which we had one policeman. A penny rai/e in those 

 parishes produced 80 to 90. That policeman's 

 wage was o5 at that time, and, therefore, if we had 

 to pay him ourselves out of our penny rate, we should 

 have had 20 or 30 in hand to apply in other direc- 

 tions. There were 17 sergeants and constables in 

 Wellingborough, and if the people of Wellingborough 

 had had to pay those men it would have meant that 

 they would have had to raise a M>\ rnpenny rate. 

 That was never done. What they did was to levy a 

 3d. or 4d. rate over the whole area, and that; went to 

 pay all the policemen in the area. Is that fair? Our 

 agricultural district could have paid its police with a 

 mil' penny rate, and had a good bit of money over. 

 On the other hand, the urban district would have had 

 to raise a 7d. rate to pay their police. Instead of 

 doing that they made us all pay 3d. or -Id. in the to 

 pay for the whole of the police in the area. 



I5.2l>2. Mr. -I. M. lliH'li'i -nt : You said, a- I 

 gathered, that you bought your farm for 5,850? 

 No; that was the price which the old farm made when 

 it was sold by auction. I was prepared to give 

 4,000 or 4.200 or a hundred or two more, but it 

 marie 5.850. 



15.203. What did you pay for it? I did not buy 

 that farm. I have bought another one since. 



15,2fi4. You told one of the Commissioners you were 

 not happy about it'-- No, T was not. 



15.205. You intimated speaking about the farm you 

 did buy that you were not satisfied with the price 

 yon paid for it? It was not quite that. I did not 

 wish to buy it at all ; I am not satisfied to be the 

 owner of it. 



I5,2IVi. Why? Ki-ause I think farmers are very 



much better off renting land and employing their 



i] in their farm not locking their capital up 



in the land to pay them 3 or 4 per cent, when it 



ought to be employed in their farm at a higher per- 



15.207. You could sell it again, could you not? 

 'ily, but if MI, what is my son going to do a 

 you n Ionian -about 35. 



15.2f!. Tin- Cliuirman: I do not like to stop you, 

 Mr. Henderson, but the witness did say lie would not 

 h:iv<- Ixiught his farm unless his son had said thlat if 

 the farm were sold over their heads he would have to 

 leav the country? I do not know that I actually 

 said that, but that was the substance* of it. 



15. '.*;;>. T, I think you actually did use those 



W..!' 



15.270. .1/r. 7. M. Ilititlrrxon: I understood you to 

 say you wore i!i-..atisfied abnut it. Are you satisfied, 

 or "are von not? With what? 



15.271. With having had to purchase your farm? 

 I am dissatisfied because I did not want to pur- 

 chase it. 



Not 



15,272. Then you are dissatisfied with the farm?- 

 il with the farm at the price I gave for it. but 



dissatisfied with the conditions that forced me to 

 buy it. 



15.273. You do not like to be an owner? No. 



15.274. You wish to bo a tenant? Ye*, under fair 

 conditions. 



15.275. You are satisfied with the price you paid 

 for it? Satisfied so far that 1 think it was well worth 

 the money at the time, but dissatisfied because I 

 think land will come down in value within the next 

 few years. 



15.276. Beyond the fact that you think land will 

 come down in value you have no reason to .find fault 

 with your purchase? Not with that particular pur- 

 chase, but I do not think the practice of farmers 

 owning their own land is a good one; I think they 

 are better off under a reasonable and fair landlord 

 than farming their own land. 



15.277. You prefer that the landlord should get the 



3 per cent, and not you? Yes, you can put it in that 

 way. Landowners are usually men with large capital 

 and they can afford to accept 3 or 4 per cent for their 

 money, whereas a farmer is generally a man with 

 small capital, and he ought to get more than 3 or 



4 per cent, return on his capital. 



15.278. What do you say lias been the result cf the 

 Corn Production Act guarantee during the years 1918 

 and 1919? What extra quantity of wheat do you say 

 or do you believe it has produced? None at all not 

 the Corn Production Act which you are speaking of 

 now. The present prices are not due to the Corn 

 Production Act. 



15.279. The Corn Production Act was passed in 

 1917? Yes. 



15.280. Did that or did that not have the effect of 

 increasing the production of wheat in 1918 and 1919? 

 I do not think it did at M ; the Corn Production 

 Act has not raised the price of wheat to its present 

 pitch ; it has risen independently of that Act. 



15.281. I am not referring to price; I am referring 

 to the quantity produced? I do not think it did 

 not the Corn Production Act 



15.282. Mr. Cautley asked you something about 

 .shipping whether as shipping got more free and 

 freights easier, freights would not come down and 

 more corn come in from abroad at a cheaper price. 

 IK that your idea? Yes, I suppose that is what .vill 

 happen. 



15.283. Do you know how many tons of shipping 

 vrere sunk during the course of the war? No, I have 

 not gone into that; that is not my business. 



15.284. Would you be surprised to hear that it 

 amounted to something like 8,000,000 tons? No. 



15.285. How long do you think it will take before 

 that amount of tonnage can be replaced? I have no 

 idea ; you can hardly expect a farmer to be able to 

 answer such a question as that. 



15.286. So far as shipping is concerned it does not 

 ii'terest you it does not affect you? Yes, it affects 

 me decidedly ; but as to how long it will take to replace 

 the lost tonnage, I can express no opinion. 



15.287. If you can express no opinion with regard 

 to that, you cannot express any view as to the future 

 prospects of agriculture? Yes, surely, I can. 1 do 

 not know whether it w.ill take one or two or three or 

 four or five years to replace the tonnage, but whenever 

 the replacement is effected it will affect the price cf 

 vheat. 



15.288. You have no idea when that will be? No. 

 I may have my own vague ideas, but I do not think 

 they are worth anything. 



15.289. Dunns; all these years of which you have 

 {liven us an account, there was a period during which 

 you were only earning 3 per cent. Did it ever occur 

 to you to throw up the business of farming? A good 

 n any times, and I was very nearly doing it more than 

 once. I went so far on one occasion to enter into 

 negotiations for going into another business. 



. 15,290. I suppose you know in the early nineties, 

 when you were making this 3 per cent., that the bank 

 rate was only 2 per cent, for two years, money was 

 so cheap? It did not affect me much. I may have 

 known at the time, but I really do not remember. 

 I do not see what that has got to do with it. 



15,291. If you had had more capital then to put into 

 your farm, you would not have got more than 3 per 

 cent, for it? As a matter of fact, at that time I 



