SCARCITY OF N.Z. WOOLLEN GOODS

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 199, 18 May 1920, Page 7

SCARCITY OF N.Z. WOOLLEN GOODS

: QUESTIONS AND ANSWER'S. • i ■ • '; (To the Editor.) 1 Sir,—lt is stated that blankets throughout the Dominion are not being maim- ; factured owing to the mills concentrating " upon making tweeds. lam rather of ' the opinion that most of tho theories nd- : vanced as to the shortage of Dominion ' manufacture of wodllen; goods are en- ■ tirely wrong. 1 Before -tlio • war terminated notwith- ' standing that khaki cloth, etc., was 1 manufactured for our troops, you could ' get.a fair supply, of men's .suits, trousers, 1 and underwear, and tweed by the yard. ' Now you .cannot buy an I ven-. ;. tare to truthfully say that'vou cannot [ .go into a warehouse or'a'woollen ■ factory • and buy a pair of trousers, boys' shoi;*Jl 1 'flannel by the .yard, or suits of tweedi 1 ; and I wjjl further assert that you won't ' find'a manufacturer who will take an order;to make-anything for \-yon during ' the next three mopths from JJIOO worth of goods down to 20s. There .is going ;■ to be a famine of alii Dominion-made woollen goods. There really, is-ciio now, ' and it.is only beginning to be felt. There is room for six more woollen ■ factories in' New ;Zealnnd. Goods from England and abroad will never lejnud- : cd in our country at the 'rires wo can make and sell at here, i It is, a most '"• .serious position, and the ;jioorer classes will, feel it keenly. Box suits (slop ; .goods) are now being sold at ,£l2, and so surely, as materials become scarcer so purely will th* prices rise. ■ ' A lot has. been said about our shortage of goods, but nothing has been said regarding the critical position the whoC'c of the inhabitants of the Dominiou .stand in at the present time. Are neessary goods being exported, especially flannels and tweeds ?• No one seems able!to discover:the truth. As a business man I know that Koney is not of any value in relation io the purchase of goods for. my business. There aTe no goods and yet plenty of* money—l am, BUSINESSMAN. , [Inquiries were made -by a Dominion reporter at the local offices of 'various , .woollen manufacturing companies touch- . ing .the .matters referred to by "Business Man." The chairman of directors of . the 'Wellington Woo Men Company (Mr. W. H. P. Barber) stated, that none of his company's output; was being'sent out of the country, nor did ho nelieve-any of tho other NewTealand/mills were'exportihg a single yard of material. Tho whole of their output was boin? placed ot the disposal of tho lueitl trade. • The statement that blankets wore not being 1 'manufactured in the Dominion wis quite erroneous. ( As a raatter of fact, the I Peteno MiJ'o' were turning out 400 pairs ! -if blanfcots per in order to.cope .' with, tho; NH" Zealand bade.. .As re- | tweods,. they uere manufacturing i .»s much no. poaaiblp with the machinerj | *nd labour at their command. In this j coniMction there could be -no question I that'the output «if the various mills was i being somewhat restricted on account of . Iho ebortego of labour. Mr: Barber's statement wan endorsed by an official of the Kaiapci who said that'absolutely, nothing wos being ex.ported'by the New Zealand-mills. The. r-umber of blankets being manufactured by the Kaiapoi Company was,equal to its 19U output. 'The shortage cf imported tweeds on account, of their increased prices had •-rented tan unprecedented demand for'the New Zealand manufactured article, and this vas keeping the supplies short. '' Personally, he did not behove that' colonial box suits were fetching If (hey were, then "someone was getting a bigger profit than they ought to get."]