INDUSTRY RESTIVE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26622, 19 November 1947, Page 4

INDUSTRY RESTIVE

PRICE INQUIRIES

RIGOROUS NATURE OF INVESTIGATION Complaints came before the monthly meeting of the Otago-Southland Manufacturers’ Association this week concerning the methods of investigation said to be employed by Price Investigation Tribunal officers. It was stated that firms were subjected to the most rigid investigations, presumably for no other purpose than the carrying out of a routine check on manufacturing industries. Previously, members said, it had been an accepted practice that when a manufacturer applied for a price approval he should submit facts and figures in support, but the wide powers with which the tribunal was invested were to-day being utilised in a manner which suggested that the Government was acquiring information of a very confidential nature which was in no way related to the requirements of price control. It was contended that the State's interference with private enterprise was closely related to these investigations, and although objections had been lodged by manufacturers with the Parliamentary Bills Committee in regard to the proposal to make permanent war-time organisation of price control a State department, these had not yet been examined. Manufacturers, it was claimed, were still left in the dark as to the full import of the Bill and the powers which have been assumed by the investigators.