Wheat (1) - Part 2

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accurately, so as to swear that a certain amount of stock was there. 2483. But to overhaul your mill and take stock, advantage should be taken of the dry season, and the stock should be run down, so that the matter can be finalised and dealt with before you operate on the next year's crop?— It is quite possible. If you were dealing with flour only, you could remove the flour from the mill; you could store it where the Imperial order is being stored at the present time. But then all these flour mills are dealing with local orders also, and supplying to local customers; and that is where the fault lies, so far as the millers are concerned, in this Scheme. If they were all working for the Imperial order and for nothing else, that would be all right. But here you have them supplying Brown & Burns and McSorley and all the other bakers. 2484. Could not that be overcome by a portion of the mills which now operate under the Scheme supplying the local consumption, and then the second portion of the mills taking up that work after overhaul?—Every one of the millers has his own particular customers, and he would not be agreeable to that under present conditions. If the mills were taken over by the Scheme, that is to say run for the profit of the Scheme, it would be possible for the Wheat Board to run for local consumption whichever mills suited them, and to run the balance of the mills for the Imperial order. 2485. Suppose the Government were to follow your recommendation in the matter, would it not be better to clean up and finalise under conditions similar to those I have just mentioned?—Undoubtedly. Any finalisation of accounts is always advisable, because it has the effect of checking the correctness of statements. But my experience of mills is that unless the mill is clear of all my stock, that would be practically an impossibility. The lower the stocks were, the nearer of course to correctness you would come. The Government have already said that they are not favourable to the compulsory taking over of the mills, so that I do not know we shall get much further. 2486. In your criticism of the flour millers as to the 7d. per bushel for gristing, have you taken into consideration that the millers are working on an abnormal quality of wheat, on a lower grade quality of wheat?—I do not know that they are. 2487. Is not f.a.q. wheat suppose to be for oversea shipment?—Yes. 2488. And below f.a.q. wheat shall be gristed?—The weevily wheat. 2489. Or below f.a.q. wheat as regards shrinkage?—Yes. That may affect it a little, but very little. 2490. It is an unknown quantity; it might be worse as time goes on?—Every parcel of wheat coming into the mill would be different. The millers call everything weevily. They would call wheat weevily if there was a weevil in a hundred bags of it. I know that 7d. per bushel for all the mills, good, bad, and indifferent, in this State is an absurd proposition. Some of the mills are losing money, or some of them are making a very great deal of money. 2491. As to bags. The millers would have a claim for some amount in bags under this 7d. per bushel, on account of the extra number of bags and the quality of the bags received?—Yes; but if you go into any up-to-date mill, you will find it has a cleaning process for the bags coming in with wheat, and those that are good enough are used again. 2492. And the lower quality go for bran and pollard?— Yes, those that have to be patched. But in normal seasons, when wheat is use shortly after it is bagged, the percentage is small. 2493. You have criticised some of the commissions. Do you think any portion of the commissions provided for should stand?—No. I think the 7d. per bushel must be payable proposition to the mills, running 24 hours. I hope I have made myself perfectly clear that the del credere commission is an absurdity. The commission of 3¾ per cent. on farmers gristing is the height of absurdity. Although clause 23 does not say it is a del credere commission, all commissions, as I have pointed out on a previous clause, are del credere; and therefore we have a right to read "del credere" into the clause. 2494. That is in conjunction with clause 21?—Yes. The Farmers and Settler's Association, being a political body, are of course beyond the pale; but if the Minister or the advisory board or anybody had sent along a draft copy of either agreement to the farmers or their association, he would have got honest criticism; and the Government are getting exactly the same criticism now. We are always prepared to give what is in us to the Minister in the hope that it will be to the advantage of the farming industry. But to bring an agreement like that gristing agreement on us, is only evidence that a grown man has been playing with the Board, inasmuch as the miller has got the heavy end of the stick and the poor farmer has got nothing. 2495. Your association, then, is not antagonistic to the Minister?—How could we be antagonistic to a man who came into Parliament through the existence of our association?—If Mr. Baxter, as a member of the Country party, had come along and asked his fellow helpers in the farmer's movement, there was nothing in the world to have stopped us from giving everything we had in us. But he goes along and makes this agreement in conjunction with Mr. Keys, a man who is an ex-employee of one of the biggest of the wheat handling merchants; and so Mr. Baxter gets us into this tangle. 2496. By the CHAIRMAN: I think you will find this agreement was made in November, when Mr. Keys was not manager?— You pointed that out before. Mr. Baxter was responsible for the agreement, anyway. I am sorry I have made any reference to Mr. Keys in connection with the agreement, but Mr. Keys was general manager when the agreement was made public. We farmers do not know who is hitting us. All we know is that we are getting everything that comes to us. Therefore, the man in power at the time is the one who gets the credit for it. 2497. By Mr. HARRISON: In the acquiring of the wheat, not in its gristing, do you think the most important man is the sub-agent who has the receiving of the wheat and its weighing?—That is where the primary mistake can be made, in the receiving of the wheat. If a man is conscientious and sees that the wheat is f.a.q. wheat, without foreign substance or foreign matter, no smut, no pinched wheat, he is laying the foundation of a good wheat scheme. After he has done that, he has to see that the wheat is stacked properly, which is another very necessary matter. When you come into the headquarters of the handling of the wheat, you then get other very responsible functions. You have the issue of certificates, which must be done after checking the sub-agents' tallies, which are not always the best kept. The certificates have to be properly recorded. You then have to arrange for dunnage and covering, which is another matter; and you have also to arrange for inspection. I cannot see that the present method could be improved upon. I am not saying that the Westralian Farmers, Ltd. are doing the work absolutely faultlessly; but they have the advantage that they are one body handling the wheat instead of four or five persons at a siding. Thus one gets concentration of effort, and, consequently, reduced charges. It is quite possible that Dreyfus & Co. might have done it even better than the Westralian Farmers have done it. But in the first two years we had this absurdity, that one might go to a place like Ardagh and find at a little store four receiving agents, each man trying to get one's wheat. In such circumstances the idea comes to you, "These men are working for somebody, and they are being well paid for it." You realise then that it is the farmer who is paying for it. It is well for the Commission to realise that every one of the mistakes which have been made has been paid for by the farmer, and none by the Government. Yet the Government are the ones who are appointing the people who are to run our business. 2498. If any negligence or waste occurs at that particular point, the acquiring, it cannot be eradicated?— No. That is the start. 2499. It is absolutely necessary to get the best men available for that particular work?—I will say, the most honest men. Once I carry away a certificate saying that I have put in 1,000 bags carrying a certain amount, that is the finish; no one can deny it. 2500. Your association have not had any great complaint with regard to railway facilities, as regards.