9141. Would it be a better principle to adopt, when the legislature wishes to subsidise any particular form of development, such as clearing, tank sinking, house building, or fencing, that it should distribute through the financial or mercantile institutions so long as they guaranteed to supervise the expenditure of that money ? - I would not like to answer that question without giving it some thought. It would perhaps be better if the money passed through some recognised channel. If the Agricultural Bank were transformed into a trustee bank, such funds could then be made available through it to all sections of the community, but if it was made available through commercial houses and banking institutions, I would express some doubt as to efficient carrying out of this scheme. Your next question asks, what in my opinion are the principal hindrances to agricultural progress in this State ? - The principal hindrances consist of the absence of good roads and the lack of water through bad holding ground in many parts of the State. Other than these there are practically none. Where there is good soil, it remains for the individual to make good, provided of course there are normal seasons. Knowledge, combined with scientific farming, are the best assets a man can have, but the farming industry in this State is too young for a man, say, in St. Georges terrace, to go on to virgin land and expect to make it a payable venture straight off. As an inducement for capital the farming industry is not attractive until the farmer is well established. One of the greatest hindrances, in my opinion, to the agricultural progress, in addition to what I have already stated, is that there is a large number of farmers whose farms have been over capitalised ; money has been sunk in farming which has not borne in result, except that many a man has gained his experience by the loss of such capital.

9142. Plainly, politics and excessive credit and a certain amount of carelessness are the greatest hindrances ? - They are contributing factors.

9143. By Mr. PAYNTER : In regard to the statement as to the farmer making good, you only refer to the farmer who has an account with you ? - I want to convey that if a man can pay his merchant for all the goods he has purchased from him he is making good, because other storekeepers see that they are paid at the same time, and we generally assume that if a man pays us all he owes he has paid everybody else.

9144. He may have paid all his accounts and have nothing for himself ? - That hardly arises. If a man would be left with nothing in his pocket when he squared up his merchants, he has to borrow from an other source. What is generally adopted, from our point of view, is that if a man finds himself in the position to pay his debts we will give him credit to the amount he pays off his account for the next season. I think that policy is adopted by other merchant firms. If a man owes us, say, £50 and he pays us, we are prepared to give him credit for another £50.

9145. The man making good with your firm is in a position to go on although he may not have the cash ? - The fact that a man has lived during that season and clothed himself and paid his way, proves he has not gone back.

9146. By the CHAIRMAN : You have no cases of men who have paid for their yearly supplies, and in addition have been able to reduce their overdraft from previous year's ? - We have instances this year of men who have paid for their current season's requirements and have paid us something off their back accounts.

9147. Generally, when the position the position of the 2,500 farmers financed by the Industries Assistance Board is considered, on whose account the Industries Assistance Board consider they will be able to pay £200,000 off their merchants' account into it, should indicate that the great body of selectors are making progress, although slow ? - Yes.

9148. And a more favourable indication when we remember that these 2,500 farmers are the most necessitous in the State and are living under the worst conditions and have had the greatest difficulties to overcome during the last few years ? - That is the best indication.

9149. Therefore, if the worst are forging ahead, the good must be making good in larger proportion ? - They are ; except that every merchant has had the experience that a man has become so heavily involved that he has walked off his holding, but that will always happen, perhaps in a lesser degree in the future than in the past. I would like to emphasise this, in regard to the relation of the farming class to the merchants, that there is that section of the farming community who have a very wrong conception of business morality. I could instance hundreds of farmers who have some time or had an account with us unpaid, off which a slight reduction has been made ; but those same men, who are receiving assistance from the Government, place their Government cash business not with the merchant firms who have been carrying them for years but with other firms with whom they have no liability. It is typical in a large number of instances. The man you assist you offend when you ask him to return that with which you assisted him or to give you some consideration.

                                           ( The witness retired )

                                                --------------------

FREDERICK ERNEST WINGROVE, Accountant, Dalgety & Company, Ltd .; sworn and examined :

9150. By the CHAIRMAN : Do you regard the position of agriculture in this State as satisfactory or otherwise ? - I am not an expert in farming or agriculture, but it appears to me to be satisfactory at the present time. I have had an opportunity of speaking to various farmers and questioning them as to whether they themselves think they are on a satisfactory footing, and they all seem to speak most hopefully of the future. I have been in the State since 1903. I am, of course, speaking from the merchants point of view.

9151. Are your relations with your farming clients satisfactory or otherwise from the merchant's point of view ? - From the merchant's and farmers point of view there is no doubt that business is on a more satisfactory and a sounder basis than it was two years ago. In the last two years merchants have curtailed a certain amount of credit, and that ought at once to put things on a more substantial basis. Credit in the past has been too freely given, and farmers were prone to take things too lightly. Money was too easy to obtain, and I do not think