Subsidy Benefits More Than Bread

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29798, 14 April 1962, Page 8

Subsidy Benefits More Than Bread

The effect of the subsidy on wheat sold to flourmills provided many users, not bakers or housewives, with flour at highly-subsidised prices, said the Wheat Committee’s submission to the Committee of Inquiry into the wheat, flour and bread industries in Christchurch yesterday. A table of estimated flour sales for the year ended January, 1962, showed that the annual subsidy was £3,253.000 on flour sold to bread bakeries. The subsidy on flour to pastrycooks and cake kitchens was estimated at £342,000, and on flour to grocers at £725,000. Other subsidy estimates for the year were: flour to manufacturers of biscuits, £228000; ice-cream cones. £9000; glue and plywood, £16,000; starch. £180.000; sausages, £26,000; dog biscuits. £14.000 “We estimate that during the period the subsidy on bread was the equivalent of 3.94 d on a 21b loaf and 4s 4.16 d on a 251 b bag of flour.’’ said the statement.

The subsidy rate on flour for bread bakeries is £23 13s 7d a ton; on flour to pastrycooks, £2l Is 8d; on flour to grocers and others, £lB 6s 7d.

The committee recommended that the bakers pay on the higher scale for all flour and claim a rebate at quarterly intervals for flour

used in the production of price-controlled bread, these claims to be accompanied by a statutory declaration and subject to audit. It also recommended that the inquiry investigate the extent to which the practice of the return of stales had developed.