THE PRICE OF MILK

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2418, 25 March 1915, Page 9

THE PRICE OF MILK

Sir,-'-Half-truths are proverbially misleading and I think that some of the information given you by the secretary of the Wellington Milk Vendors' Association and published m your paper of oven date would come under that heading. • ■ The circulars quoted are quito correct, but . Mr.. Duffy evidently failed to inform you tliat last April when the producer charged Bd. per gallon for milk the Wellington vendors retailed it at Is. Bd. per gallon. He also>omitted the fact that his association endeavoured to advance the price of milk to od. per quart for this present month, and this would have come into effect had it not been for the action of one firm. The firm in question roi'ueed to agree to the rise on the grounds that the vendors had'no justification in doing so when they were only paying Bd. per gallon to the suppliers. As a compromise, however, it was decided to charge tho public sd. per quart from April 1, but mark their resolution that they only intended to pay Bd. per gallon for it.

Mr. Duffy has laid stress upon that iwrtion of the circular which says that the fanners would only supply persons approved by their association. Do the Wellington vendors give two months' credit to unknown persons for a household supply, and should not any producer take reasonable Care that his milk supply goes to a person who has a reasonable prospect of being able to pay for it?

With regard to the id. per gallon charged by the association for handling the farmers' milk: The Farmers Association is purely a co-operative concern, and the levy of Jd. per gallon is a fund from which the working expenses are taken, the balance being used for the purpose of paying bad debts' (which up to the present have amounted to nearly £1000) which loss would otherwise have had to be borne by individual farmers. Mr. Duffy has endeavoured to justify the actions of his association in the matter of prices charged, but, Mr. Editor, let. tho public—the people who pay —know the whole truth, and the.y after all are the best judges. I am confident that the producers, in this instance, have nothing to hide, and I for one am quite willing that the general public should know the price I receive for my milk, just as they are acquainted with the wholesale prico of meat, bread, potatoes, etc. I do. bowet'er, object to being made responsible for charging exorbitant prices for the food which our children and invalids' live upon.

I am, I believe, the producer of the greatest quantity of milk for human consumption in the Hutt Valley, and as such, would be quite willing that the whole matter be laid before tho Food Commission or a committee of Wellington's prominent business men, who should decide whether the prices charged by tho farmers are not, under present conditions, very reasonable indeed. I even vonture to say that, if the wholesale prices are not maintained, Wellington will soon be left without winter milk.—l am, etc., C. M. STRAND. Loiter Hutt, March 24, 1915.