ASTOUNDING EVIDENCE

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10508, 9 February 1920, Page 6

ASTOUNDING EVIDENCE

SPINNERS’ DEFENCE EXPLODED BY FACTS. PROFITEERING ACT A FAROE. By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright An b. and N.Z. Cable Assn, and Reuter. (Received February 8, 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, February 7. The report of the Profiteering Act Committee on Wool-spinners’ Profits issued by the Board of Trade shows that enormous profits were made by the spinners. The highest instance of excess of percentage on profits officially allowed works out at 3000 per cent., and in no case is the excess profit over that allowed by the War Office schedule of fair prices less than 250 per cent. The committee says that at least half of the forty types of yarn investigated showed a profit of not loss than 25d per pound, the excess percentage accruing to the spinners being: On penny per pound yarns,_2soo per cent.; on threepenny per pound yarns, 833 per cent. The spinners objected to the figures on which these calculations were based as misleading, and supplied their own figures, which showed profits ranging from 240 to 250 per cent. The committee finds that no facts were disclosed to support the view that the spinners wore inadequately remunerated by the War Office during the war, and that the Profiteering Act had no apparent effect on the prices of worsted yarn or profits arising therefrom.