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Despite the denials published in the press | this week on behalf of the American Meat Trust, | indications point to the fact that a sinister | intrigue is going on in connection with the | Freezing Works at Wyndham.
| It will be remembered that after a great deal
| of bickering and agitation
Primarily they were designed to ensure an | adequate supply of cheap meat for the metropolis | and serve as an influence on meat prices | throughout Western Australia.
|They have had a tainted record. The estimates | of construction were enormously exceeded, and all | kinds of sinister innuendoes given birth | regarding contracts. Whatever the public may | have thought regarding the nature of some of the | contracts, they were but a circumstance compared | with the purposes now being worked for by certain | predatory brigands.
|In fact, if the intrigue now lying somewhat | dormant because a General Election is imminent, | succeeds, these Wyndham freezers will yet find | the public cursing the day they were started.
| Instead of meat becoming cheaper it
| must
Some time ago a similar freezer was started at
| Port Darwin. Now these Darwin works were
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Naturally enough the Trust viewed with concern | the probable appearance of the Western Australian | Government as a trade rival at Wyndham. But | Trusts are managed by men of subtlety. They know | that even Governments can be influenced. And | when a Government is unresponsive to the wishes | of a powerful vulture, the Government can be | destroyed.
|So the Trust directorate conceived the "idea" | of eliminating the possibility of the advent of a | powerful competitor. Not only that, but it saw | ways and means of converting a possible danger | into a source of actual and potential advantage | with little cost to itself.
| Said the American Meat Trust:~~
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Such was the reasoning of the subtle spirits | controlling the greatest monopoly in the world. | There was, of course, the prospect of failure to | be allowed come in at the right moment to be | considered. But the Trust has its | representatives all over the earth. They | reported that the prospects of the coup | succeeding were satisfactory.
|And the Trust was not out to make any | mistakes. Its committee of ways and means took | charge of the business. Firstly it sent out a | man to prospect the situation. He was given a | complete outfit as though he were a member of the | Tunnellers' Corps. As a matter of fact, this man | was to do the underground tunnelling that would | destroy the public ownership of a valuable works | and hand them over to the clutch of a great | Trust.
|This tunneller did not work with hammer and | gad. He was of the kind that makes little noise. | And of course he had to be careful and | discreet.
|The Trust chose for this work a Victorian, | gave him a weekly allowance of 30 pounds. And with | this 30 pounds a week the representative of the great | Trust proceeded to find out the vulnerable points | in the fortress his masters desired | destroyed.
| Thus many dinners and entertainments were
| given. Leading politicians
So the last Parliament dealt among other
| things with the pastoral leases of the State.
| That Act was a step in the game. It altered the
| land laws of Western Australia so that the
| grabbing propensities of monopolists
And the public slumber, the silence of press | and publicists, at the great steal was a high | tribute to the craft of the aforesaid tunneller. | It was obvious that all was well. The game could | now be played to its conclusion. All that was | necessary was to insure that a General Election | should come and go in peace and quietness, and | that Labor should not succeed to office. | Otherwise cancellings of an awkward kind might | follow.
|But the Trust was not going to waste time. It | watched with interest the flounderings of the | State in the sea of financial deficit. Up at | Wyndham expenditure was going on and revenue not | coming in. The hour had struck for the first | open proposition. Therefore, various paragraphs | begin to appear in the public press. It is | announced that somebody has entered into | negotiations with the State for the control of | the Wyndham Freezer.
|Denials follow, explanations are made. The
| Premier makes a statement. Somebody writes and
| insists that Vestey Bros. is an ultra British
| concern. He denies that it is a branch of the
| American Meat Octopus. Let us not forget,
| however, that immediately war broke out Sir
| William Vestey
The Darwin works cost more than the estimate. | We are told that the outlay can be covered by | working them to their full capacity. One would | imagine it was not intended from the first to | work them fully. Darwin does not lend itself to | pressure. As a matter of fact, were the Trust to | treat 500 head or more cattle at Darwin, the | route to the works would in twelve months | resemble the Sahara desert. They know this well | and do not intend to eat themselves out.
|The Trust proposes to ease the Darwin | difficulty by getting hold of Wyndham. The | facilities at the latter port are far and away | better than at Darwin. The route in is through | better country, and the cattle will arrive in | better condition for chilling. But Wyndham will | not carry 500 head daily. Therefore, the | proposition the Trust is pushing is to get hold | of Wyndham and amalgamate the two freezers, | apportion the cattle between the two branches, | and treat in this way up to 700 head daily.
|And it remains the eternal truth that the | negotiations have been advanced considerably. | The men in the present Government are as a | majority opposed to State Training Concerns. | They are all the time declaiming against the | principles of collective industry and are in | Parliament the representatives of the forces of | economic brigandage outside.
|American newspapers openly assert that the | Meat Hog has been grunting to some purpose in | Australia. Trade Gazettes and commercial | bulleting are full of references to the opening | of the pastoral areas of the Commonwealth for | exploitation.
|Lefroy has never given any explanation of his | notorious Act of the last Parliament. It was not | needed for any purpose but to foster aggregation. | If it does anything else we cannot discover | it.
|The State should not entrust valuable public | properties to men who are opposed to the State | operating such properties. That negotiations are | on we challenge the Premier to deny.
|And we further assert that while three years | from now the return of the Nationalist Government | will have resulted in the establishment of the | American Meat Trust in the West.
|It will be housed in the building erected by | the State with public money for the public | welfare. The interest bill will still be ours to | foot. But the Vultures will have pecked our | flesh.
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