Some Present-Da}) Policies. 37 



their output or to get rid of wasteful and inefficient 

 methods. Power is given to the Agricultural Executive 

 Committees to require that the farmers will observe the 

 rules of good husbandry, but that obligation cannot be 

 related to the guarantees on wheat and oats, because the 

 obligation can be enforced equally on farmers who depend 

 upon other crops, and it is obviously within the rights of 

 the State to insist on this rule whether guarantees are 

 given or withheld. 



The case for guaranteed prices during the War could 

 be legitimately argued, when the farmers were being 

 compelled to grow cereals. If the State is to compel the 

 cultivation of particular crops the farmer is entitled to 

 claim that he should be relieved of any loss incurred by 

 following a policy forced upon him. But when the farmers 

 demand and are granted guarantees on certain crops 

 without any obligation to grow these crops, the policy 

 must be defended on other grounds. Two reasons are 

 advanced by the advocates of guarantees. The first is 

 that since the farmer is compelled to pay a minimum wage 

 he is entitled to have a price guaranteed. The argument 

 is not well founded. Minimum wages are enforced in other 

 industries but no guarantee of prices is given, and the 

 farmer cannot claim that his position is peculiar in this 

 respect. The minimum wages in agriculture apply equally 

 to all farmers, milk, beef, and potato producers, and if 

 the argument is sound for cereal growers, as good a claim 

 can be made out for the other farmers. How little relation 

 there is between the wages of farm workers and prices of 

 agricultural produce, and particularly cereal prices, has 

 been shown by Mr. A. W. Ashby in a paper contributed 



/^nVAf^ 



