The Manawatu Herald. Thursday, August 6, 1914. NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 1281, 6 August 1914, Page 2

The Manawatu Herald. Thursday, August 6, 1914. NOTES AND COMMENTS.

The Government should take immediate steps to prohibit the public from being exploited in food stuffs by certain blood-sucking monopolists. At present there is absolutely no justification for the rise of prices in sugar, flour and oatmeal, yet we find flour and sugar making rapid advances. The people in this country, particularly the industrial classes, will feel the pinch of hard times if the war continues, and it is the bounden duty of the Government to punish any criminal attempt on the part of merchants or monopolists to rig the market. There is an Act on the Statute Book prohibiting trusts and combines from playing the part of the octopus, and its provisions should be strictly enforced and if necessary made' more stringent. The public will, naturally, have to pay more for certain imported goods, which at a pinch could be done without, but there should be no necessity for an increase in the necessaries of life. The public in every community should watch out for the octopus and assist the retailers to keep it within due bounds. Possibly the tradespeople will find that merchants require to shorten credit and this iu turn will operate on the consumer. But this should not tend to inflated prices.

An attempt seems to have been made to take advantage of the

European crisis to create a false scale of prices in New Zealand for foodstuffs, says yesterday’s Dominion. The public, we trust, will not be led into the error of imagining that it is at all necessary tor them to rush for supplies or to behave in any way indicating panic. There is nothing in the situation to warrant anything of this nature. New Zealand, fortunately, is very happily situated at the present time. Its financial institutions are in a strong position, its people have passed through a long period of abounding prosperity, food supplies are plentiful, and are likely to continue so. In the event of war our overseas trade will be effected, and our import trade with Germany, France and the Mother Country will be more or less dislocated. Germean trade will fall off completely. This probably will mean increased supplies from the United States. There will necessarily be some interference with trade and finance, but the best means of minimising this will be to face the situation calmly, and to exercise care and prudence. There is not the least occasion for alarm as to. the ordinary requirements of citizens being fully met.