MORE BUTTER WANTED

Chronicle (Levin), 10 August 1946, Page 8

MORE BUTTER WANTED

-Press Association

Rationing Is Not Aiding Britain WATERSIDERS' RESOLUTION

Bv Telegraph-

WELLINGTON, August 9. That butter ratioiiing is not aiding the people of Britain and is detrimental to the health of New Zealand children, was the opinion expressed by the Wellington branch of the New Zealand Waterside Workers' Union in a resolution passed at the monthly stopwork meeting yesterday. The branch requests that the Governrnent shonld lift imrnediately the restriction on butter. "We do not helieve that the rationing of foodstuffs in New Zealand is having the desired e.ffect upon the living standards o/ (he British who are being prevailed upon to increase primary and industrial production for export, the starving hordes oi' Europe heing used as an incentive," says a statement aecompanying the resolntion. \ Thc Wellington move follows similar suggcstions from otlier parts of the eountry, the most notablc being a resolution of the Auckland branch of the Waterside Workers' Union, passed at the meeting which deeided, after the Oovernment's cxplanation of the position, to load butter for America. The Auckland waterside workers songht an increase in the Dommion's butter ration, but the following day tlu Prime Minister (Mr. Fraser) gave an assuranee in the House of Bepresentatives that the butter ration in New Zealand would not he increased. The text of the Wellington resolution is as follows : — "That in view of the detrimenta1 effect continued butter rationing is having on the health of the children of the Dominion, esneciallv on the children of the lower-paid workers who depend on cnt lnnches, and in view of recent exposures determining the real reason f.or rationing being of a mercenary nafnre, this branch of the New Zealand Waterside Workers' Union requests that the Government should lift imrnediately the restpictions on the purehase of butter. / f ■ •

A ' 'Siefates of " Ainerica.U' "Evei^ /-easonable'- person, would agree /liay it was New Zealand 's boundeft clutv to do all in its power to assist. thW people of Great Britain in particulatf ' and of the world in general to be properly fed, even at the rislc of being over-generous, but it was also important that New Zealand ensured that tlie health of the nation was not put in pawn to financial interests, " says the aecompanying statement. "In defiance of what lias been publicly -statcd, we believe that econoniic pressure is being applied on the British Government to force them to accede to the dietates of American financial interests. We exoneratp the New Zcyi land Government of any complicitv in this matter as we recognise that the old axiom of ' business is business' is being ruthlessly applied. "It had been reported that in Denmark producers of meat and bacoa could not find enough buyers and farmers had been warned not to slaughter cattle because there was a glut of meat," says the statement. "The eatch of fish in Danish waters had been cut to a tenth of the normal. Swedish iisli mercliants had offered to sell this year's catch to starving Europe at half the market price, but the oft'er was not accepted and twothirds of the catch went back -into the sea. The facts were from the Britisb Press and added to the pieture presented in the Dutch Press in which reports criticised Britain for not permitting Holland to sell vegetables to Germany. "Tn the meantimc Britain is cutting its beer to supplv barley" to its zono in Germany 'and Mr. Morrison a.groes to cut wheat reserves in exohange foT some ldnd of promise from the TTnited .States to supply food to the Brilis1 zone, " the statement coucludes.