1 Frs., 1898. ] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 107 
“ What are you doing to secure proper prices for your produce in Britain? 
Well, I will answer the question. You are spending a lot of money here.by 
co-operation, or you are allowing some bold speculators to spend money in your 
interests to produce butter as good as can be shown in the world. You have 
freezing stores and proper accommodation in ships. Past the latter part you 
do nothing. You send Ministers of the Crown and troops to England, but you 
halt dead when the marketing of your produce seems-to demand all your 
energies. Remember, the great point is what is the actual price your butter 
— good, bad, or indifferent—brings in Britain. If butter were sold by auction 
in London like wool or tallow, I would not hesitate in saying that you might 
get a true quotation. Business men here say to you, ‘Send your butter 
through us. We shall have our representative in the oid country ; or you can 
send yours.’ And, gentlemen, as I said at the outset of this, I firmly believe 
we have honest business men; but there is no combination in our business 
men, and without that you can never gain in Britain sufficient volume of trade 
to command the respect you deserve. Sell Australian produce in Australian 
depots presided over by men of well-known ability and integrity, and let them 
be well paid for their services. In the depdts agents of known 
respectability may sell, and in selling learn what they don’t know now—the 
Be iealue of Australian butter, meat, &c. 
How are you to combine? How are Victoria, South Australia, 
Queensland, and this colony to present a bold front to those sharp British 
traders? I would have the Governments of the respective colonies to 
co-operate, form a pool, establish the depdts, and conduct such depdts until the 
business was on a firm basis. You know the old, well-worn sentiment, ‘Health, 
wealth, and prosperity.’ Well, gentlemen, why should the State or Govern- 
ment stop after uttering the first of these words. The Government looks after 
the health, and even goes so far as to have your dairies closely inspected ; but 
when it comes to the furtherance of the wealth and prosperity the Government 
is to stop—at least, so say some people. ‘Leave this and that to commercial 
enterprise,’ said the gentlemen who strongly opposed the first acts of this 
colony’s Export Board ; but will the small artillery of those good, honest, and 
no doubt well-intentioned traders pierce the armour-plate of British markets ? 
I contend that the middleman who opposes this suggestion of the joining of 
Governments for the purpose of improving markets, effecting better distribution, 
and reducing freights, should be able to promptly show to you a better plan. 
“T am speaking to-day, not as a journalist, but simply as a citizen, one 
who has at least some stake in Australia. Are the Governments of other 
countries to act in fostering export trades while the Governments of Australia 
are to look on and wait for the enterprise which is so slow in its approach ? 
The State here is a big landlord, a big railway proprietor, and is big in several 
other directions. Let it go past the health stage, and go on so as to promote 
wealth and prosperity. It may at least be allowed to assist commercial 
enterprise by forming depots for the sale of Australian produce in London, 
Liverpool, Manchester, and other parts of England.” 
From Mr. Dowling’s knowledge of the business it may be taken that 
Australian produce is sold privately in London, which goes to show that the 
producers are in the hands ef traders at this end as well as in England; and 
every time the produce is handled, the expense is, to a greater or less extent, 
borne by the producers. : 
I may ask, How are the producers to find out the actual value of the butter 
shipped by the various factories to London ? 
Tf the farmers imagine that the traders are going to make known the prices 
obtained, they are labouring under a very great delusion. 
I give it as my opinion that if the farmers were paid a price for their milk, 
based on the prices realised for the butter in London, a great deal more satis- 
faction would exist among the milk-producers. However, this is a matter,for 
the farmers themselves to consider. 
