1937-1938: The Australian Honey Debacle

You can find most of the ‘source’ documents I used in writing this story at https://www.beekeeping.nz/NZBDA/1937_Australian_honey_import/

The importation of Australian honey has always been a contentious issue for New Zealand beekeepers. In recent years it has been related to the systematic opposition to import health standards that would allow Australian honeys into NZ.

But back in the 1930s, it was – in fact – still legal to import some honeys, or at least honey from Australia or the US. In many cases the imports were used in manufacturing or confectioneries, as the stronger flavours of honey, especially those from Australia, were not generally acceptable to NZ consumers.

But an unwise and poorly communicated “importation” of Australian honey in 1937 led to:

the resignation of the 3 members of the NZ Honey Control Board,
the appointment/election of a new Honey Control Board with different people and policies,
the liquidation of NZ Honey Ltd., which was taken over by
the Internal Marketing Division, moving to assume control of most aspects of honey marketing for the next 15 years.

The NZ Honey Control Board

The Honey Control Board (HCB) was created by Parliament in 1924 to provide control over the exports of honey. It worked hand-in-glove with the Honey Producers Assn (HPA), and then from about 1932 with NZ Honey to ensure those companies exported as much honey as they could, of an assured quality, at the best prices they could obtain for the NZ producers.

NZ Honey was formed in the early 1930s to replace the HPA, by then in liquidation. At any given time from its start in 1924, the 2 producer representatives on the HCB were directors of the HPA, and then later they were both directors of NZ Honey.

From 1932 the HCB had at its helm a champion of business and industry in the form of Jack Butland. Butland was involved in the processing and packaging of foods, with Chesdale cheese being the product he is probably best known for. He had no real experience of the honey or bee industries, apart from his company acting as the agent for sales of honey. Butland exuded confidence and capability, and with his many contacts in both Government and business he was seen as a real boon to the HCB.

Jack Butland Enters the Industry

After his appointment, in the wake of the failure of the HPA, Butland was elected Chairman of the HCB. And almost immediately after his appointment he left for a seven month “fact finding” tour of the United Kingdom, Europe and other locations, as he “familiarised” himself with the marketing of New Zealand’s Imperial Bee honey brand. One contemporary said that all he really achieved on this extended trip was to bring back an agreement (in principle only) relating to some previous debts of the HPA. But for his own Butland Industries he brought back the NZ sole agency for Morton and Co, NZ’s English agent for Imperial Bee honey! Throughout the time Butland was purportedly doing such good for the beekeeping industry, he was doing very well for Butland Industries…

Small Honey Crop Brings Problems for UK Packing

The problems for the industry came as it sometimes has with a near complete honey crop failure. The 1936-37 crop was very poor throughout the country. There would be insufficient stocks of just about all grades of honey required, and especially for the Imperial Bee pack. Even the darker honeys of the South Auckland and Waikato regions were in short supply.

Butland and the HCB arranged with NZ Honey to fill in some of the shortfall by buying 100 tons of Australian honey. Percy Hillary, one of two producer representatives on the HCB, went to Australia for a month to ultimately agree to the purchase of something like 100-150 tons of Australian honey. It was the arrival of the first consignment into the port of Auckland in April 1937 when it all started getting messy…

Billy Bray Raises Concerns

“Messy” in the sense that the 30 tons had leaked and created quite a mess on the wharfs of Auckland. And messy in that Billy Bray, a well-known Canterbury beekeeper and packer of honey, got hold of the story and developed the support of many beekeepers.

W.B. “Billy” Bray was a strong-willed beekeeper who was not at all happy when he heard what was happening with the HCB and NZ Honey. Even though he was not a significant exporter, he shared a common feeling that all beekeepers had a stake in the policies of the HCB; he feared for the longer-term damage to NZ honey’s reputation in Europe.

In the month prior to the NBA conference in June 1937 Bray wrote caustic, and challenging, letters to the papers. He wrote letters to the Minister of Agriculture. He organised and incited public meetings in Timaru and Christchurch. He even got a personal meeting with the Minister of Agriculture, the notes of which are a delight to read, with the Minister refusing to address the issues that Bray put before him so clearly.

Bray’s basic complaint was that the HCB had absolutely no powers, no authority, no legal means by which to purchase the Australian honey for any reason whatsoever. And he was absolutely correct. While it wasn’t illegal to import Australian honey, it was simply not within the HCB’s powers under the 1924 Act to start dealing in foreign honeys, effectively. Behind the scenes, the Crown Law Office was making that point clear to the Government, who were quickly diving for cover…

Butland’s Real Plans?

Butland was considering doing things other than handling NZ’s honey exports, for sure. He described plans to buy cheaper “… Canadian, Australian, Jamacian (sic) and Californian honeys” to blend with NZ honey to sell as Imperial Bee honey. By this time (late May 1938) the Government was becoming unhappy with the whole saga. But Butland knew that almost no matter what wrongs the HCB may have committed, the Government was likely to legitimise them in retrospect, to avoid their own share of any embarrassment.

The 1937 NBA Conference

Butland addressed the NBA Annual Conference in Wellington with confidence and swagger. He stated categorically that the HCB had not bought 200 tons of Australian honey. (He didn’t admit it was 150 tons, with an option to buy more of the same, and longer term plans to buy a range of other foreign honeys to blend with NZ honey for Great Britain.)

Butland emphatically denied that “Australian honey had been blended with New Zealand honey and exported to the British market as New Zealand honey.” (He didn’t acknowledge it was only because it had turned out to be lower quality than the HCB thought they were buying, and so it wasn’t suitable.)

Butland was resolute – “Not a pound of that honey was ever put into ‘Imperial Bee’, nor would it ever be sold as New Zealand honey.” (The plan, before the Government laid down the law, was to blend it into the “Moore’s Empire” honey pack, the darker/stronger honey pack for NZ honey that could not be used in the Imperial Bee honey pack. Butland wanted to buy more ‘suitable’ foreign and Empire honey to blend into Imperial Bee, but was stopped before he could do it.)

The NBA conference passed a resolution expressing “complete confidence” in the HCB and approving its Australian honey purchases. But the issue of the legal authority for the HCB to purchase the honey had still not been addressed by Butland, or by the Minister of Agriculture. There was the question of how the HCB could export Australia’s honey to better advantage than the Australians themselves, unless some shady activities were involved. The Government would not like to have to explain that to their Australian counterparts. Finally, there had, apparently, been a request to have the country of origin marks on the shipment removed – though it was refused, it was not a good look! The press (and Bray!) continued to ask why the HCB was so secretive in the previous months, if in fact the whole transaction was a “wise and justifiable one.”

The Political Climate of the Time

Butland’s appointment to the HCB in 1932 and his first three years had been with a Government that was more attuned to his free-wheeling way of doing things. From 1935, however, he was dealing with the First Labour Government. Their policies would not allow for much of what Butland had been doing and wanting to do, however well-intentioned (or profitable, as Butland would remind them, though no profit ever eventuated…)

Butland’s strategy had been to maximise the quantity of honey that could be supplied to the United Kingdom as Imperial Bee quality, and he was willing to do that by any foreign purchases and blending that would ensure continuity of supply to the still-growing market. The Government made it very clear to him that he could not proceed as he had planned.

What Was Butland Really Up To?

That first shipment of Australian honey? No explanation was ever provided for why it was shipped to NZ in the first place, rather than being sent straight to the UK. Combine that with a reported suggestion that the Australian “country of origin” marks be deleted (which the Comptroller of Customs refused to do…) and it certainly looks dodgy. It seems that this first shipment of honey may have been destined for either manufacturing grade or, at worst, as the Empire pack. But Butland was quite openly planning to purchases cheaper foreign and Empire honeys to include in the Imperial Bee pack. He was hoping to keep it all going to his plan. He felt the decisions should be related to whether the label refers to “New Zealand” or “Empire” or “Blended…”

Liquidation, Resignations, New Appointments – and the IMD Control

The Government still did not want to have to admit that Butland and the HCB had been somewhat out of control. Early 1938 brought it all to a new direction. NZ Honey – the company that the HCB worked closely with – chose to go into voluntary liquidation, with the Government’s Internal Marketing Division (IMD) taking over honey stocks, equipment and marketing for both local and export markets.

Butland and the producer members of the HCB (Percy Hillary and Walter Watson) all resigned at once, saying they couldn’t continue in the role unless they were allowed to act in the ways they had previously. The damage had been done, and the beekeeping industry moved quickly to support the IMD and the newly appointed members of the HCB – Wallace Nelson (Otorohanga), Lin Robins (Temuka) and Henry Penny (Hawera).

Wallace Nelson had been, in fact, the Chairman of NZ Honey. He continued to play a significant role in NZ honey marketing for many years.

Butland did not appear to have any further involvement in the industry, and both Hillary and Watson lost a lot of support and credibility.

But ultimately, the Labour Government had to do one last thing to support Butland (and cover for their own deficiencies in managing him). In September 1938, as part of the Finance Act 1938 they “legitimised” the HCB’s actions in retrospect, an implicit acknowledgement that Butland and the HCB had been acting ultra vires – outside of the law.

A last note in the file came in early 1939, with the Audit Office having found yet another foreign honey purchase by the HCB, this one from the West Indies, and asking the Director-General of Agriculture what steps he was “prepared to take to regularise the transaction”. I can’t find any evidence of an answer to that…

The Next “Phase” of NZ Honey Marketing

Billy Bray had been right all along with his claim that the HCB had no legal powers to be purchasing Australian honey as it did. And it brought down the HCB and contributed to NZ Honey’s liquidation.

The entry of the Internal Marketing Division into honey marketing provided the next phase of honey industry marketing development, and lasted from 1938, through the time of the War, until the establishment of the NZ Honey Marketing Authority (HMA) in late 1953.