6469. Who accepts? The miller?— Yes. It is mutually agreed between the Scheme and the miller.

6470. Does that often take place?— No; only on rare occasions. The officers are at the mills taking bag weights.

6471. Does your officer examine the bag, after seeing it taken into the mill, insofar as regards its being empty?— No. He is not supposed to do that.

6472. Do your officers ever know, when the wheat is shot out of the bags, the quantity of wheat growing to or stuck to the sides of the bags?— Yes. If it is very apparent, the officers take the bags and weigh the average of them.

6473. Is that average from the weight the mill is working on?— Yes.

6474. What becomes of that wheat which cannot be milled?— It is scraped off and bagged up, and then sold as fowls' feed.

6475. Who pays for that labour?— The miller; it is part of his work.

6476. Does the miller sell it direct or through the Scheme?— The Scheme sells it and gets credit for it unless the mill gets an offer and that offer is accepted by the Scheme. If the stuff is not marketable it is inspected and destroyed, but there is very little of that.

6477. Is the mill responsible for any demurrage through trucks not being unloaded quickly?— The miller is not responsible over and above the arrangement of the number of trucks to be received daily.

6478. Who is responsible for sending wheat to the mills generally?— The instructions are issued by the Scheme, and they are carried out by the sub-agents of the Westralian Farmers, Ltd.

6479. Then someone would be to blame if a rake of trucks were sent in to the mill and the miller would not accept them and they had to be consigned somewhere else?— The miller is responsible up to the quantity agreed upon, that he is to receive and if the wheat is millable.

6480. Who settles any dispute as to whether it is millable or not?— I see whether it is millable. In every case I have arranged with the miller; we have had no difficulty.

6481. So far you have had no refusal to mill wheat?— In many cases, but I have never known them turn down wheat which we know is millable.

6482. What was the object in sending other than millable wheat to the mills?— I do not know.

6483. Someone would be to blame for it?— The man who loaded it. In many cases wheat has gone to the mills which has not been fit for milling.

6484. There is a big loss there?— Yes, there are handling charges and extra freight to the next destination.

6485. And the Scheme has to pay for all that?— It is a charge against someone else; I do not know that part of the business, but undoubtedly someone has to pay.

6486. By Mr. HARRISON: Would it not be better to inspect the wheat prior to it being consigned to the mill rather than reject it afterwards?— Decidedly. There would then be less chance of inferior wheat filtering through to the mill.

6487. It would save cost?— There would be saved the cost of inspection at the mill.

6488. Would it be cheaper if the inspector went to the various centres?— It would be cheaper than the present method, if there was an intelligent man with experience in charge of the loading.

6489. You think that the agent who receives the wheat should know whether it is millable wheat or not?— Decidedly.

6490. What has been the condition of the wheat you have had to reject?— There has been sweated, tipped, mouldy, and musty wheat.

6491. Which any ordinary man with a knowledge of wheat would know was not fit for milling?— Yes, with the exception of the smutty. I have seen tipped wheat which has passed as f.a.q. Any ordinary man should know the difference between wheat which was and which was not fit for milling.

6492. How long have you been connected with milling?— Twenty four years.

6493. The average farmer receiving wheat should know a millable sample?— If he has had any experience at all he should have a fair idea.

6494. You have not received from a farmer for gristing purposes wheat that you would not mill?— In a few cases.

6495. What state have you found the depôts in this season?— At Spencer's Brook I saw one pocket which appeared to me to have been wet.

6496. Was the damage caused by water from below or by rain?— One or the other.

6497. What would you suggest to protect the wheat from wet?— My experience is that you cannot protect it too well and too quickly.

6498. You think then that the Scheme made a mistake in not providing cover and not giving instructions to cover stacks?— I do not know what instructions were given regarding the covering of the wheat. I know that wheat should be covered practically as soon as it leaves the harvester.

6499. Did you notice whether damage had been done in any other way except by rain?— I noticed weevil at Spencer's Brook, Midland Junction, Geraldton, and Tambellup, though not in the stacks. I noticed the weevil in the trucks.

6500. Do you think that the wheat became contaminated in transit?— It does undoubtedly, but the wheat I saw at the various depôts did not pick up the weevil in the dirty trucks. As far back as January last at the Midland depôt I saw one bag of wheat which was in a truck and which was badly weeviled. There were also half a dozen bags around that particular one, and they, too, were running with weevil, but one bag was very badly eaten. At Spencer's Brook on one occasion I saw five trucks with nine or ten weevily bags of wheat.

6501. Did you report that to the Scheme?— Yes.

6502. Do you think it would be better, instead of having the depôts as they exist now, to have a greater number of sheds nearer the centres of production?— I believe in concentration. The administrative costs would be very much less. There is also the advantage if a greater number of sheds were erected nearer the centres of production that you can haul the stuff from the various sidings with the rolling stock which is available, and you can cover it up quicker by having the shorter journey.

6503. Do you not think it would be better to have the wheat covered quickly?— I think so.

6504. Would it not also mean that a larger percentage of the wheat would be operated on, and that a greater proportion would be handled direct from the farmer's wagon to the store?— If we had more stacking sites in the country, yes.

6505. By Hon J. F. ALLEN: What is your reason for believing in the concentration of stacking?— It can be looked after easier and you have not to look for so many expert men to handle it.

6506. That is cost of supervision?— Yes.

6507. Is there any provision made for seeing that the flour after leaving the mill is free from weevil?— Not by the Scheme. The miller looks out that it is not so.

6508. He is supposed to do. He is not responsible for the flour after it leaves his hands?— All flour is inspected on arrival at the port.

6509. Examined to see that it is free from weevil thoroughly?— As thoroughly as it can be done.

6510. By the CHAIRMAN: You pointed out that wheat was sent to the millers in not a fit condition for milling owing to want of experience. You mean experience on the part of the men in charge of the sidings?— Either from want of experience or not taking the care which he should take. Some wheat is coming through to the mills and not fit for milling.

6511. Should not the officers of the Scheme be aware of the quality of the wheat in each stack?— Yes.

6512. And if the officers order the person in charge of the wheat at sidings to send to the mill, the person so ordered has to do it?— If he carries out his instructions he should, but I do not know any officer of the Scheme who would ask anyone to send in inferior wheat for milling purposes— damaged wheat.

6513. You think it is necessary for the men engaged in sampling, etc., should be expert men?— They should be experienced.

6514. That being so, can you account why samplers have been appointed at depôts this year who had never had experience previously?— As far as I know the samplers at the depôts are ordinary intelligent men, who can draw a sample as instructed by the chief sampler from bags and submit them to him. Those samples at depôts draw an amount of wheat from a number of bags from each truck arriving and those samples are taken to the chief sampler, who is an experienced man.

6515. Seeing the amount of dockage that has taken place this year by the acquiring agents' men at the