WOOL SALE FAILURE

Press, Volume C, Issue 29671, 15 November 1961, Page 5

WOOL SALE FAILURE

Few Buyers Attend

(N.Z.P. A.-Reuter—Copyright) MELBOURNE. Nov. 13. An attempt by the Victorian western districts port of Portland to become a woolselling centre crashed early this afternoon when Portland Woolbrokers, Ltd., announced a last-minute cancellation of today’s sale. The sale was regarded as a test. It was not under the auspices of the National Council of Wool Selling Brokers and the Buyers’ Association would make no comment last week except to say it had read of it in the press.

The secretary of Portland Woolbrokers’, Ltd., Mr J. C. Collinson, said in his cancellation announcement: "Only 16 woolbuyers turned up for today’s sale. They held a meeting a few minutes ago and decided that there were insufficient to provide propel- competition and that if the sale went ahead it would be a fiasco.” Mr Collinson said woolgrowers and Portland people were still determined to make the town, 252 miles from Melbourne, a woolselling centre. “We’re not going to let this buyer boycott stop us . . . but for the present the whole matter is in the melting pot,” lie said. Mr Collinson said later that his company was going ahead with plans for a later sale, not necessarily on the scheduled date of December 8. Growers from the western districts and the south-east of South Australia decided at a meeting in Portland to send a deputation on the matter to both the State and Federal Parliaments.