CORRESPONDENCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 9 March 1921, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE PRICE OF MEAT. (To the Editor.) Sir, —All classes of stock have gone down in price everywhere, but butchers’ meat is still at the old high price. If you mention it to ' them they have the same old excuse, that hides and skins are too cheap and it does not pay them. How did butchers make fortunes some flfteefi or twenty years ago, when stock was even higher in price than it is now. At that time you could get your meat for about 3%d per lb. It is not altogether the high wages to be blamed now, as they will tell you, because few butchers employ many hands, but many business people haye got in to the profiteering habit and don’t like to come down; But they will have to sooner or later. Wany private people buy kill -them at home, and it only costs them about 2%d per lb, nt the price sheep are now. It is not even of the high price we have to pay that we are complaining, but the rubbish inflicted on us. Take, for instance, tinned corn beef, which you can buy in small tins, called 21b tins, at the local store. It looks more like corned tripe than beef. Not long ago I bought six tins from the local store. The charge was 2s 4d per tin, which is a scandalous price for about 12 ounces. Anyhow those six tins were packed in a frezing works not far from Wanganui, (so the label told us). The first two tins opened contained nothing more than pure cow’s udder. Nothing else, the three next tins Were a mass of fat, and the sixth tin, a mixture of dirty hair and fat. Now, Mr. Editor, is not that enough to set any man thinking? Fancy 2s 2d for nothing but rubbish I Some works do turn out good meat, but even the best of tinned stuff, you don’t know whether it is beef, mutton or boiled rabbit. It is about time somebody began to move in the matter. My advice to all who can do so is to buy meat privately, or buy a few sheep for about eight or ten bob each, have your own meat good and cheap, and sell the balance to your neighbor at a, reasonable price, and starve out the profiteer.—l am etc., J. J. Rataplko, March 7, 1921