FARM-WORKER AND FARMER
By FRANK SYKES
WHEN the Wages Board approved a rise in wages for farm workers to the extent of raising the mintrnum wage by ten shillings a week the National Farmers' Union demanded a review of farm prices to meet the increased cost. Last month the Govern- ment published a new price schedule. It is calculated by the National Farmers' Union that the wage-increase will cost the farmer £25,000,000 in a full year, and that the new prices will recoup the industry to the extent of seventeen millions, leaving the balance to be found out of the farmer's pocket. In practice, it will be found that the deficit will not be shared evenly. On the more efficient farms with a high productivity per man the new prices will more than cover the wage-increase, leaving an even larger burden to be carried by the weaker brethren. The Minister of Agriculture has a good precedent for his action. Mr. Hudson fixed prices, after the last substantial wage-increase, at a level which made the farmer share the difference with the taxpayer. Then, as now, farmers were angry, and protest meetings were held in market towns. Now, perhaps, they have more cause for their anger and anxiety. Their margin of profit has dwindled. Some feel that if it were possible for them to organise their farms as they wished they could be more efficient. Many of the smaller farmers are growing more corn than they would like. Whilst the world shortage lasts they must maintain their cereal production—much of it on marginal and corn-sick land. They argue that if the Government calls the tune it should at least pay the piper.
Farm wages have been regarded as the rock bottom of the labour market, wages in other industries being fixed proportionately higher. This has been i gross injustice to the skilled farm-worker. The latest rise which has been awarded is an attempt to bring the farm- worker's standard to a point where his wages will bear some com- parison with those paid in industry. Anyone who has the welfare of the land at heart will agree that this reform is long overdue. If the new increase in prices had met the wage-increase on the majority of farms, there would have been nothing more to be said, and each farm-worker would have received an extra ten shillings a week. Now, however, the result will not be so straightforward. Many good men employed on well-run farms were already receiving wages some way above the present minimum. Their employers will be inclined to leave these men where they stand for the time being at any rate. Before the war little premium was paid to the first-class farm-worker for above-average skill. Latterly there have been signs of a healthy spread taking place ; but for the moment this tendency will be stopped, and it may lead to a levelling of wages which is undesirable where it removes an incentive to acquire greater skill and efficiency. At the other end, there are employees who have been unable to keep pace with the development of the industry. On arable farms, for instance, there is often a man of lower calibre than the rest who " minds the cavings " behind the threshing machine or pulls thatch into bundles ready for the thatcher. If the farmer has to pay a man incapable of much else four pounds a week, it is an added incentive for him to buy a combine and relieve himself of the necessity to thresh or thatch. In the past, agriculture has employed some who would not have found work in industry. At the new wage rates, farms will not be able 'to carry any passengers.
These are complications inseparable from such a minor revolution, and in no way do they, detract from the justification on the major issue. Above all it is to be hoped that trade unions concerned with wage rates in industry will not use this increase as a lever to raise wages all round. If the new m'n'rnrm agricultural wage becomes a basis for a level which, in proportion to skill and industry, allows a man an equal standard of living whether he works in the fields or in a factory, and if better housing and better rural amenities are not long delayed, it may be the means to end the flight from the land which has sapped the strength of the agricultural industry over the past hundred years.
The new schedule of farm prices must be studied in conjunction with those at which the Government buys from overseas. The price to be paid for wheat of the 1947 harvest is to be raised substantially— to the extent of 2s. 6d. per cwt. On an average, farmers will receive 19s. per cwt. plus a subsidy of £2 per acre. As part of the campaign to stimulate wheat production, that sum is more than is necessary to meet the higher wages. Unless American prices fall, this will be no more than the cost of wheat bought in the U.S.A. and landed at Liverpool. This state of affairs may be only temporary, but for the time being it confounds all convictions held by economists and others that wheat cannot be grown economically in this country. The new prices will leave a wide margin of profit to the wheat-grower on land best suited to the crop, but to production on the thinner soils will still yield a poor return.
From many points of view the necessity to raise wheat prices to this level is regrettable. A year ago farmers had hopes that they might make a start towards organising their rotations on a peace- time basis. Many who farm land where the climate and soil are more conducive io stock-farming would have reduced their own acreage with pleasure and relief. They must continue to save their harvests from small fields on hillsides in between showers, where they would rather tend their cattle, pigs and poultry. Meanwhile farmers on the other side of the Atlantic increase their pigs and poultry to supply the British housewife with bacon not always to her taste, and eggs out of a carton, all paid for in dollars.
There is to be little change in the price of barley. For a period in 1941 the price Pan riot, and malsters paid £5 a hundred- weight for corn which had been worth two a year before. When control was clamped on, the price was left high in order to encourage farmers on poor land to extend their cereal average. It is in just such areas that the production of cereals has increased most and that the most spectacular feats of reclamation have been performed. Through the war period wheat and barley prices have not borne the proper relation. Now wheat prices have caught up. Barley-growers cannot complain, provided they are not directed to grow wheat instead of the crop more suited to their land. There is plenty of incentive to grow sufficient fine barley to keep licensed houses open every day. If beer is short it will be because we are exporting barley to Europe. On the other hand the price paid by the Government for barley which is not good enough for the maltster must still carry a substantial subsidy if it is to be converted into animal products.
Mutton and beef producers will receive an increase which will meet increased costs where beef and mutton are grown and fattened on grass, but those who fatten cattle in yards or own hurdle flocks will find these activities even more unprofitable than before. Pig and poultry breeders are to receive a token increase given as a sop to soothe, more than in compensation for their losses in once more reducing their herds and flocks. Dairy-farmers with a high output per man employed may receive sufficient to cover the wage- increase. A new bonus for milk produced in the winter months will hardly compensate for the losses due to the lack of feeding-stuffs. Among the larger herds there, will be increased incentive to milk by machine. The smaller family businesses, on the other hand, may be thankful for the increased price, though it may not increase their income to the extent of the los. per week received by the farm worker.
In general the rise in farm wages is a step in the right direction. Had it been accompanied by a change of emphasis from corn to stock the cost could have been born by the farmer. As it is the public must pay pIrt of the, bill. Indeed, one may question the wisdom of not meeting the whole, if to meet a part results in lower production on marginal land. Tendencies are still in the wrong direction. The machinery of war has not yet lost its momentum. It will'take longer than we had thought to place our agriculture on a solid and permanent basis, and many of the causes are beyond our control.
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