COST OF LIVING

Hokitika Guardian, 25 February 1933, Page 5

COST OF LIVING

ITEMS AFFECTED

INCREASE IN DOLE SOUGHT.

(Pt Press Association — Copyright.)

WELLINGTON, February 24.

In the House, Mr Mason asked whether in view of the increase in the cost of living, the Government would increase' the allowances to relief workers. Mr Hamilton said that according to official returns, the cost of living was affected by the following items : —Groceries, dairy produce, meat, rent, fuel, and light, clothing, drapery, footwear, and miscellaneous. Only a very small proportion of these items would be directly affected by anything Parliament had done during the present session. The world’s present low price level would indicate a substantial fall must take place in the near future in the prices of many of these items. Although a few items might .rise, the corresponding fall 1 in other' items should .more than offset this rise.

It was therefore quite possible that on the whole, the cost of living would continue to fall as it had been doing in the past foffr or five years, as shown by the following table of the period increase per cent, over July 191'4 : —1928, 60.2; 1929 , 59.9; 19.30, 56.2; 1931, 44.3; 1932, 33; November, 1932, 29.1.

The Minister quoted the following table comprising the latest figures with prices in 1914; Groceries, twentysix per cent, above; dairy produce, eleven per cent, below; meat, nine per cent, below; three food groups (average), six per cent, above; fuel and light, sixty-three percent, above; rent, fifty-two per cent, above; clothing and drapery, fourteen per cent, above; miscellaneous, fifty-nine per cent, above, giving an average over all groups of twenty-seven per cent, above. He added: “In the event of a rise in the cost of. living taking place, through >a genuine and substantial rise in export prices, I would be delighted to review the allocations for unemployed.”