CANTEEN PROFITS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18340, 2 September 1921, Page 8

CANTEEN PROFITS

SHARE FOR THE DOMINIONS. WHAT BECAME OP THREE MILLIONS ? (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, July 19. Some time ogo a committee was appointed to devise a basis for ascertaining the profits ot tho Navy and Army and the Expeditionary Force canteens, and to make recommendations as to their . apportionment. The Expeditionary Force Canteens Committee was dissolved in October, 1920, and in the following December it w-m decided that a permanent central canteen organisation tor the three services should be incorporated with the title of the Navy, Army, and Air Force Institutes, which on January 1, 1921, took over the assets of the two. original canteen organisations. . According to the reportof tho Parliamentary Committee now published, e. sum of £391,220 was expended on instructions from" the Army Council in the supply of comforts, etc., to tho troops during tho war. There has heeff handed over to the United Services Fund a sum of £3,019,000 in cash and an amount of £1,000,000 funding loan, having a value at cost of £BOO,OOO, and to tho forces of the United States of America and the various dominions end colonies a sum of £540,000 in cash. A further amount of £1,500,000 funding loan, having a value at cost of £1,200,000 and £900,000 in cash, are held.

A total eum, therefore, of £7,080,220 has been in part distributed, and is in part held an liquid assets. This amount is entirely opart from other assets held by the Navy, Army, and Air Force institutes, which consist of capital in the business and of a certain amount of surplus stocks not yet realised. The total profits will, therefore, bo considerably in excess, of the amount ot £7,080,220 above referred to. After the shares of the forces of the United States of America, the various dominions and colonies and India have been satisfied, it is believed that the amount available ns the share of the United Sendees Fund will not ho less than the figure of £7,000.000, which has been quoted by Lord Byng as the amount which the United Services Fund expects to receive. The Daily Express is still wanting to know what became of the other £3,000,000 profits. “The total profits of the Expeditionary Forcecanteens amounted to more than £10,000,000,“ says that journal. “The Navy and Army Canteen Board, stales the report, still carried on the business of the E.F.C. during demobilisation as a separate concern. There appears to be no doubt that considerable losses have been incurred. This is the passage in the report which guardedly refers to the three millions of the ten millions total profit of the E.F.C. that will not bo handed over to the United Services Fund. The committee recommend that an account of these dfter-war losses should lie given by a balance sheet illustrating the transactions. Tho questions which are still unsolved are these; ‘Did, the Army Council instruct the Navy and Army Canteens Board to carry on a losing business in order that the arm might be kept supplied with comforts? Must ex-service men lose three millions of money because it was spent by a body which cither traded in such circumstances that they knew they could not make a profit, or traded carelessly?”