DAIRY BOARD’S ACTIONS

Taranaki Daily News, 13 September 1935, Page 7

DAIRY BOARD’S ACTIONS

EFFECT ON THE MARKET CHARGE BY LABOUR CANDIDATE. FEWER IMPORTERS’ AGENTS. LEGACY OF PRICE FIXATION. The contention that the Dairy Board, through its f.o.b. sale price fixation and the limitation of the number of agents, had contributed to the low prices of dairy produce was advanced by Mr. P. Skoglund, Labour candidate foi- the Stratford seat, in an address at Inglewood last night. Little harm would have been done if the Dairy Board’s activities had been confined to questions of freight, insurance, etc., and co-ordinating the industry generally, Mr. Skoglund said, but someone conceived the idea of price fixation. The board was given authority to act in, that direction by the Government and the industry and thus the industry received a shock from which it had, in his opinion, never recovered. It was not necessary for him to remind farmers of the amount of money the industry lost through the board’s action. Notwithstanding that the board had not yet learned its lesson and there was still a modified form of price fixation, the number of firms through which the produce was sold was limited. Was it any wonder that the price of dairy produce on the English market had fallen? He suggested that those firms which had been deprived of the privilege of handlihg the produce had looked for business elsewhere. The consequence was that more foreign butter had been introduced to the London market and sold in competition with New Zealand’s, thus depressing New Zealand prices. Tire merchants could not be blamed, as they must get their business from somewhere. The same thing would happen if a merchant in New Zealand were deprived of an agency he had successfully managed for a number of years. He would immediately look around for an agency for a similar class of goods and push the sale of the new article to his old customers to the detriment of his former agency. There was no doubt in his mind that that Was the case at London in connection with the sale of New Zealand dairy produce.