SUBSIDY PAYABLE TO BUTCHERS

Southland Times, Issue 25706, 23 June 1945, Page 4

SUBSIDY PAYABLE TO BUTCHERS

INCREASE ANNOUNCED (P.A.) WELLINGTON, June 22. The acting Prime Minister, Mr Nash, announced tonight that it had been decided after consideration of additional evidence to increase the subsidy payable to retail butchers as compensation for the recent increase in the export meat schedules from a rate of 1/3 to 1/7 per 20/- worth of meat ration coupons. BUTCHERS’ SHOPS TO REMAIN OPEN Butchers’ shops in Invercargill will not be closed, although local butchers claim to be working under the same difficulties as the Dunedin butchers, who have decided not to open for business on Monday. This was made clear by the president of the Invercargill and Suburban Master Butchers’ Association, Mr G. Metcalfe, in a statement to The Southland Times yesterday. “Invercargill butchers are in a similar position, and although they are not taking action, they give the Dunedin butchers their moral support,” stated Mr Metcalfe. “Costs and wages today have risen considerably above the 1939 level. Wages have risen by about 25 per cent, and prices for some materials have increased by up to 500 per cent. The cost of seasoning, for instance, has risen by 300 per cent., and there are many other items similarly affected. Yet the butchers’ retail prices are held at the 1939 level. The subsidy we had been promised was only half the amount required to balance our ledgers and keep our businesses on a sound basis.”