THE SALE OF MEAT

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 85, Issue 48, 26 February 1941, Page 4

THE SALE OF MEAT

Sir, —Mr. G. F. Moore's letter advocating better mea for local consumption opens a very wide question, which is not without a few difnculties. But they are of not an impossible nature. Like some of the Homeopathic remedies, the letter “touches the spot.” I have seen in my 50 years in the trade, very great progress made, shops altered and brougnt up to date, better sanitary arrangements, such as lined walls, electric rans, flyproof doors, concrete floors, chillers computing scales, slicers and mincers ano many other up-to-date measures. But the purveyance of meat seems to nave remained stationary. We are told that experience tends to prove that the demand tor education and an that -is implied by that word, generally springs from an organised opinion. Well, the butchers should not be lacking in that, because there was an organisation known as the Worshipful Company of Butchers, as far back as the year 1180, of which 1 suppose, our present-day Master Butchers' Associations are the lineal descendants. One of the things this old company seems to have had the power to do was to say under what conditions meat should be sold. It was also empowered to seize and destroy all bad meat.

Now we come to our present day methods. There is no doubt the Master Butchers' Associations have brought about many reforms that, have been beneficial both to the trade and the public, but there is one measure I could never agree with and that was when they fix the selling price of meat. It is based on the price of good quality—which simply means this: The man who sells first

grade quality gets no more than the man who sells an interior quality. , 1 have seen plenty of tickets on i meat to say it was prime ox or j wether mutton, but I have never seen ■ one with prime cow or prime ewe on ' it. Even among those engaged in the i trade the absence of such tickets 1 seems very unfair. My opinion is I that it should be enforceable by law ■ that meat should be classed and sold i according to its real classification. I You cannot sell margarine for butter, the law does not allow you to, so why ; permit parallel deception with meat? [ After all, it is the public who decide | what they want and from experience I I have gathered, it will be for the I superior article. I Now, here is where the first diffi- | culty arises. Tre small man, who is i just as keen to give his customers as I good a quality as his bigger competiI for, is seriously handicapped by the following: The man who is in a big way car» go out and buy, say 20 bullocks and cut them out in a week, he has one lot of droving to pay on them and they come into his shop with all the bloom on them (a big item). Now, take five small men who only yut four bullocks each in a week; that means there has to be five lots of droving to pay. If he buys more, he seldom has any feed for them, and they go back in condition. There are not many beef men wljo would consider a draft of four out of a line of bullocks. The same conditions apply in some measure to sheep. The way out of the difficulty, as 1 see it, is to give the small man the same conditions as the big man. Byestablishing a Smithfield—or dean meat market (Smithfield has been the backbone of the retail trade in England) in places say the size of Wanganui, or Palmerston North. This would save the retailer much time and worry, cut out a lot of his waste and ensure him having fresh meat daily, and if he so desires, be a meuium of putting the best ot quality in his shop. There are plenty of men available who are capable of establishing a Smithfield market. When butchers can be sure of buying what they want and when meat is classified and sold according to its class and value, I am quite sure the public will demand the higher class offered, but it must be put there for them to buy. Let me say in conclusion, that <the inspection ot meat in some districts is a farce; some townships with a population of over 2000 people are without a public abattoir or resident inspector. Wanganui is fortunate in that respect.—l am, etc., H. E. HAWKES, 12 Caius Avenue, Gonville.