WELLINGTON TOPICS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17622, 8 November 1920, Page 8

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

GOSSIP OF THE WEEK. t REPORTS OF FALLING PRICES. REPLACEMENT VALUE QUESTION. [BY TELEGRAPH. —OWN CORRESPONDENT.] WELLINGTON, Saturday. Business in the city is distinctly on the quiet side. The fall in prices reported abroad has found little reflection here yet, but there is an uneasy feeling as to the future among importers, and the tendency all round at present is to curtail all avoidable expenditure. A correspondent in one of the newspapers asks with some point whether, under the changed conditions, we shall hear so much about " replacement costs t " which figured so largely as a reason for advancing the prices of goods in stock immediately on advice, of upward movements abroad. So far no general tendency is visible to reduce prices in view of lower replacement costs. The principle is scarcely likely to present the same attraction on a falling market, and doubtless we shall hear the last of this overworked argument. The Arbitration Court's latest cost-of-living bonus starts us off on a- new round of wages and prices. , No fruitful suggestion for escape from this vicious circle is so far forthcoming, and it is difficult to see where the process is to end. Despite the occasional frantic screams from newspaper correspondents and others, one sees small evidence of a curtailment of personal expenditure bv any class. Indeed, new suits and new dresses teem decidedly more plentiful than before the war. Some people tell me that the wives of thewatersiders nowadays are more liberally endowed with fur coats than probably any other section outside the payors of supertax. How the Moaey Goes. A well-known civil servant tells me that the other morning, the family lady help being absent, he went down and took in the milk. Tom, the milkman, appeared with a lugubrious face, and on being asked, what was the matter, replied that'there was matter enough. He went to the races on the first day and lost £10, and ho went again on the second day and lost another £12. He did not find much consolation in the remark that he was lucky to be able to afford it. Easy come and easy go is the motto to-day. " Presently most of us will wake up with a shock to discover •that with all our higher pay there is precious little put away in» the stocking against a rainy day. k Wellingtonians will optimistically tell you that the spring is the windy season here, but this year's spring is a thing to be remembered forgotten, if possible, Ihe week-ends have been especially vile, and outdoor sports have been carried on under very cmtngy conditions, facing patrons got their till oi ine weather on Labour Lay, and the motoring section of them is how suffering lrom the morning-aiter-the-night-ueiore feeling with the usual sheat of speeding notices as the result of the three traps laid by the local bodies between the city and Trentham. As tho legal limit is six miles an hour tor some aist4aee oi the way, and fifteen on the open road through Petone Borough victims are plentiful and substantial revenue accrues each race day. v Our Daily Batter.

, A plea for the manufacture of margarine is made by Mr. R. S. Abrahams, of the well-known Palmerston firm, jq a' letter to the press. There have been reports in circulation that one of the meat companies here is seriously thinking of taking up the industry in a big way provided the restrictive legislation is repealed. A Wellington business man recently investigated the methods of manufacture in Holland, Britain, and the United States, and finally, I believe, came to the conclusion that the New Zealand market is on the small side for exploitation on up-to-date lines, 'particularly in view of the fact that Australia, where the restrictions are less severe, has not yet been given modern margarine. He thereupon decided to turn his attention to the Commonwealth and is now prospecting conditions on the other side of the Tasman Sea. After living for- several years on margarine during the war, I know that I would bo only too glad to purchase it at the British price of Is a pound in preference to even subsidised butter at 2s 3d.

Rumour has it that the Marlborough and Nelson folk find the increased fares a large sized fly in the ointment in connection with the improved Union Company's services across the Strait. A night service three times weekly to both Picton and Nelson is a distinct* improvement on the old time crawl backwards and forwards in the Pateena, and Nelsonians rejoice at the prospect of not being compelled to peregrinate fifty miles down through Queen Charlotte Sound each time they wish to reach Wellington by Union boat, Picton scores by getting the Arahura in place of the Pateena, but its hopes of the Mararoa or Loongana are dashed to the ground. New Zealand coastal services are certainly in a languishing condition. Fifteen years ago there were four steamers on the Wellington-Pic-ton-Nelson-West Coast run. Now there are rejoicings at getting back two of those same steamers. Houses and Housing. The Government workers' dwellings at' Miramar are turning out not to "be the horrible little dogboxes that most people ; imagined from ~ a casual survey .of the i foundations, the only portions on view I for a long time. , I'was over one of the • first three or four now practically complete, and found it a compact, bright, ! and airy house with rooms of ample size. At the price these houses are cer- ' tainly the best bargains offering here at ! present. The waiting list for them is j a long one. House agents are being hard ! put- to find houses "for their clients, and ■: one hears of surprising methods of busi- i ness. A friend of mine had a, list given ! him by an old-established firm, and was ! surprised to note a neighbour's house down in itstreet, number and all, nine rooms, price £4000. The neighbour in question was much' more surprised. He had bought the house tki while back .through this firm for £3200, and had not the slightest intention of selling. Doubtless the idea was to get a nibble and then rush round and tempt him with a profit, of £800. It certainly seems' a free and easy way of dealing with other people's property. Robbing Peter to Pay Paul, A city architect informed me yester* day that whereas the Government' Housing Department was now on the verge of completing something ■-. under half-a-dozen houses here, over a doxn private dwellings had been taken over by the State for office purposes, etc., during the past year. I have not been able to check his iigures. but presumably he ought to know. Pries ; control and 'other: State activities all mean extra staff and accommodation. This architect's sardonic comment on the Board of Trade's building rationing is "Scrap the; lot, and spend the money in giving another shilling a day to the miners. and! so 'get more" cement. It's more cement, not more red-tape, we want." Doubtless ( there » another side to this question, I and in the present dislocation of their ] work it would be unnatural if architects* I views were not somewhat jaundiced.