PROFITEERING BILL

Wairarapa Age, 30 July 1936, Page 5

PROFITEERING BILL

HOUSE PASSES SECOND READING. INTERESTING POINTS RAISED IN DEBATESMALL PROFITS AND QUICK RETURNS. (By Telegraph— 4 4 The Age” Special.) WELLINGTON, July 29. A further assurance that the Prevention of Profiteering Act will be administered with consideration was given by the Hon. D. G. Sullivan, Minister of Industries and Commerce, when the measure passed its second reading in the House of Representatives to-day. The procedure, he declared, would b 6 that if his officers found that too high a price had been fixed for an article because the seller had made a miscalculation of his costs, he would be given an opportunity of restoring prices to a reasonable level before any drastic action was taken. The administration would be reasonable and conciliatory. Every endeavour would be made to prevent the necessity of taking cases to Court, but he also wished to reiterate that where the department met with a defiant attitude and there was obvious exploitation, the. full force of the law would operate to do justice to the public, but those business people who played the game would be treated quite fairly and he expected that in a majority of cases complaints would be settled without going to Court. Answering Opposition suggestions that the Prime Minister had commenced by declaring that prices would not be allowed to rise, Mr. Sullivan said that in various discussions he had had with Mr. Savage he had found that his Leader had always recognised, accepted and indeed stressed the fact -that it would be necessary to have some flexibility—some area within which employers and business men could work to compensate them by justifiable increases in prices for increased costs. There had been weakness in the former legislation in its definition of a reasonable price, but the new Act gave a meaning to the word and definitely linked it up with increased wages and shortened hours causing increased costs which employers had to meet. The leg islation also allowed other relevant factors to be considered and gave something for the Court to operate on. That the existence of the powers of the Board of Trade Act had exercised a salutary effect in preventing exploitation was an opinion expressed by the Hon. J. G. Cobbe as a result of his experience as Minister in Charge of the Act. Competition to-day, he added, was exceedingly keen and the man who set out to profiteer did not last very long. All the big businesses of the world had been built up on small profits and a big turnover. It was far better to have ariarge sale, turning over stock half a dozen times in a year at a low profit, than to turn over stock once a year at a high profit. 44 If you charge excessive prices, you don ’t know your business,” concluded Mr. Cobbe, giving an opinion based on a lifetime in trading. The Committee stages of the Prevention of Profiteering Bill were devoid of special interest, the Bill being passed with amendments introduced by the Minister. The principal addition was a clause making an employer responsible for offences committed by a servant, without limiting the liability of such servant or agent, while provision for the inspection of documents is to be enforced by a penalty up to £lOO for failing to comply with a magistrate’s ' order. An amendment proposed by Mr. H. 8. 8. Kyle to exempt from the Act sales of primary products by primary producers was negatived by 41 votes to 18.