LOSSES IN WOOL TRADING.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 208, 2 September 1926, Page 4

LOSSES IN WOOL TRADING.

MANUFACTURER'S COMPLAINT. Writing under date July 19, our Lonidon corresondent says:— Sir Henry Whitehead, chairman of Baits (Saltaire), Limited, to whose lot it fell to explain to the shareholders the reasons for the heavy loss on trading incurred last year, gave a very doleful account of the experiences of the wool trade during the period. Trade had had to be carried on in the face of a heavy fall in raw material prices and of keen competition from bounty-fed Continental manufacturers, in the face of the return to the gold standard and of strikes and disputes at Home, and in the face of inflation in France and Belgium. The xeport of the Worsted Committee of the Board of Trade, which had recommended •gainst the application of the industry Under the Safeguarding Act, naturally did not commend itself to Sir Henry, but ihe derived some comfort from the view that it was unlikely that the Government would decide to wait for the inevitable end of Continental competition before it would give the woollen industry some form of protection against unfair competition. However, Sir Henry believes that there will this year be a recovery in the trade, co far, at least, as the special lines in which Salts are interested are concerned, and that, with more stable raw material markets, there will be a better chance of securing and maintaining a manufacturing profit.