THE PRICE OF BUTTER.

Evening Post, Volume LXXII, Issue 4, 5 July 1906, Page 5

THE PRICE OF BUTTER.

■ SOME QUESTIONS. tO THE BPITOB. Sir, — I have read with a great deal of amusement thefacts with which your reporter was regaled by the leading merchants and wholesale Vendors to justify the extraordinarily high price of butter. It is needless to say that your representative was given an excellent view of vne polished aide of the stone, but wo want to' see what .is on the underside; it is that side wo want to get a look at. The retailers of butter who were interviewed appeared to be grocers in a large way! and as they are accessories before and after the fact, their evidence is not worth the fcnnp of a linger. One grocer is reported to have stud that it was "absurd to imagine that a merchant could retail butter at a lesser profit than 2d per lb, unless he wished to find hunsolf iv the Bankruptcy Court. • That grocer was talking rather stupidly, for if a grocer can sell sugar at a lesser profit than 16 2-3 per cent, he can sell butter equally well. I venture to say that not so large a profit •s made on kerosene (Standard Oil), and the demand for oil is not so great as butter. • I think it was in your columns that I read some time ago the statement that the Butter Ring had it within their power to raise the price of butter at any time they choose, and it seems to mo that all this tulk^ about sudden demand from England, decline in winter dairying, and so forth is just so much jargon to delude the public. Two or three years ago wo had not an alleged, but an actual scarcity ; there were strong demands from Australia, South Africa, and England, and yet the price did not rise here, and it would not have risen here but for the operations of the Butter Ring. I would like to have the following questions answered : — 1. When was the so-called Butter Committee formed? 2. What were the monthly, ruling prices for butter for the twelve months before and for the twelve months after the formation of the Butter Committee? 3. Is it not a fact that . the first act of the Butter Committee .after organising was to raise the retail price of butter from Is to Is Id, and that at a time when there was no scarcity and no question of winter ' dairying ? 4. What right have the wholesale merchants to fix the retail prices? The retailers are bound to sell at tie price fixed or have their supplies cut off. 5. Is not this -action ol the Butter Committee in restraint of trade and therefore illegal? Is there no authority corresponding to the British Board of Trade to enquire into this matter, or is it necessary to have tho subject dealt with by Parliament ? 6. Are tha merchants making the public pay for any losses jncurred by them (the merchants) in the past 'through blundering methods and frenzied competition? 7. How much butter is there in the cold stores of Wellington and district now as compared with a year ago ? I can ask a great many more questions, fcr I happen to know that there is absolutely no justification for the recent advance in price. While the Butter Committee and the big grocers talk about sudden demand and the decline in winter dairying the real reason may be summed up in the- words of one of the members of the butter combination — "If we can get the price, why shouldn't we?" In this Butter Ring we have on a miniature scale the methods of the famous Standard Oil combination, and if the public let the ring survive, butter will bs at Is 3d next winter, and the summer price will bo more than Is. — I am, etc., BREAD-AND-JAM. Wellington, sth July, 1906. TO THIS EDITOR. Sir, — Kindly permit me to correct a statement appearing in your issue of today. In your remarks re price of butter, you st.ite that one retail grocer pointed out that the merchants gave 2£ per cent, discount. Such is not the case as a rule. While ther9 aro probably two or three cases where this, and perhaps even further, concessions are made, the average* retailer has to piy net cash for his butter,, and in many instances has to sell at a margin of Id profit less his discount, presumably to compete with those chosen few who can obtain such concessions as will enable them to sell at 2d profit. — I am, etc., GROCER. Wellington, sth July, 1906.