DUTIES AND PREFERENCE.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 118, 21 May 1932, Page 1 (Supplement)

DUTIES AND PREFERENCE.

The Times publishes a letter from Messrs. Charles Letto and Company, who quote the following letter from their Australian representatives: — ‘•With further reference to the charges on this shipment, we are sure you will be interested in the following figures: Amount of your Invoice, £2l • 16s 9d; exchange and stamps, £74 Os 3d; shipcharges, £6 Ils Sd; exchange and stamp £1 15s 9d; duty on diaries and calendars, £lO6 19s 2d ’barge of 50 per cent, on duty, £53 9b 7d; duty on j cases at 20 per cent " Sd: primage 19 per eent., £23 19s 3d; sales tax 6 per ■cat. (ca’ ’ '.ted on cost and duty plus 20 per cent.), £3O Ils 2d; wharfage and Harbour Trust charges, ss; marine insurance, £1 1 2d; tc'al landed cost, £517 9s sd. Without reckoning any of our own clearing charges or cartages at this end, the shipment 137| per cent, to land.” “We know of no foreign country—- 1 certainly no British cqlony,” writes th* firm, “where business is made so impossible by the high cost of duties, etc. It is clearly impossible to hope to do business in a country where £lOO worth of goous costs on landing, without reckon--IQg anv profit or commission for the iocal agent. £238. So long as Australia imposes these duties on British manufactured goods, is there any adequate reason why we in this country should give preference to Australian produce?”