BOARD OF TRADE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12063, 19 July 1917, Page 4

BOARD OF TRADE.

ITS WORK REVIEWED

SOMETHING MORE TO BE DONE.

[From Our Corkespokdent.] WELLINGTON, July 18

In the course of his speech to-night the Hon W. D. S. Mac Donald reviewed the work of the much-maligned Board of Trade, cataloguing some of its good deeds whereby the people of New Zealand had been saved many hundreds of thousands of pounds during the last year or two. After expressing the conviction that if a maximum price had not been put on wheat the price »of Hou'-r to-day would have been £lB 01* £2O per ton, Mr Mac Donald pointed out that the board had also saved small coal consumers fully "I s per ton. They had dealt in Christclmreh with the high rent and meat questions, and although no State shops Had been opened there tha butchers knew that if they did not.keep near the Imperial Government prices State shops would be opened. Rent and other questions had been satisfactorily dealt with in Dunedin, while the butter question had been settled on reasonable terms- Another matter dealt with was the price of kerosene* and 1 petrol, syid as a result of the prices the Vacuum Oil Company wanted io charge and those actually agreed upon The board had saved the people of New Zealand £IOS,OOO for twelve months. Then the board' arranged bread prices at Hamilton and also at Pukekohe. Mr M'Combs: They pav fifteen shillings for dinner there. (Laughter.) The Minister, continuing, sam that the price, of milk was fixed in V* ellingfon, while the Boa.rd of Trade by openin" two meat shops in Auckland had saved consumers £40.000 in the first six months- The price o.t meat also was reduced in Gisborne, Pa lmerston North, Mastert-on, Wanganui, and other places.' The board investigated meat prices in Wellington, but found that the shops were supplying meat at as low a pn'ca as tbev could sell it I lie higher cost at other shops was due to the henvv expense nf delivery. Tha hi'di prices in Auckland were due to the representatives of two meat trusts competing against the. butchers at sales. The scarcity nf white pine had been' investigated, and the board also had rone carefullv into the position ot retail trades. An arrangement had been made that prices wero not to ba raised without proving necessity to the board. Though prices had not been lowered materially the operations of the board had prevented largo increases Bv arrangement with the Colonial Comnanv the board had effected saving of £BO,OOO yearly to sugar consumers. The board s woik had effected toUl savings amounting to 1,380.000 a year, half a million sterling of this being saving on meat. Vl Something; n\or<* will nnvo to he dono," continued the Minister, til a House Jieartilv concurring. "Something will have to be done to put things on a" tirm and proper basis. They have had to control food supplies in England. We haven't, got to that stage, but we know where we are drifting. It all denends on the number 0/ men who will Teave New Zealand."