CLIMAX REACHED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26352, 6 January 1947, Page 5

CLIMAX REACHED

BUTCHERS’ STRIKE THREAT GOVERNMENT STANDS FIRM SYDNEY, Jan. 4. It is understood that in spite of the decision of Sydney and Newcastle butchers to close their shops from Monday the Federal Government will take no action to decontrol meat prices. The first industrial reaction to the butchers’ decision is a threat by miners to strike and by watersiders to cease loading meat. Yesterday housewives in Sydney and Newcastle invaded food stores to buy up supplies of tinned meat. Grocers expected their moderate stocks to be sold out before closing time. A report from Canberra states that a departmental conference decided to stand firm against the butchers. Commonwealth officials are counting upon a collapse of the united front of butchers within a very short period. The secretary of the Meat Trades’ Federation, Mr T. A. Herbert, explained to-day that butchers were merely asking for the right to buy meat at below the ceiling price so that it could be sold at the ceiling rate. There was no form of control on live-stock prices, and stock dealers had been leading a charmed existence right through the war. Wholesale butchers were permitted under the regulations to sell parts of a slaughtered animal separately, provided that the total sum received did not exceed the ceiling price for the whole carcass This was obviously impossible to police. Angered at the decision by the butchers to close their shops from Monday, northern miners are considering refusing to work unless assured of continuous supplies of meat. The president of the Sydney branch of the Waterside Workers' Federation said that if the watersiders were denied meat they might refuse to load it for export. Slaughtering was normal to-day, and supplies of fish and rabbits are said to be above normal.