HIGH PRICES.

Tuapeka Times, Volume II, Issue 63, 24 April 1869, Page 3

HIGH PRICES.

(To the Editor of the Tuapeka Times.) Sib, — At length we have got cheap bread, and a good many seem inclined to " rest and be thankful." But are the bakers the only sinners, and do all other tradesmen sell at prices to suit the times ? I don't think any one who has to pay for the groceries and butcher meat consumed by a large family, as -I have, will answer this in • the affirmative ; so let us set to work and endeavour to effect reductions in all the necessaries of life. Carriage is no doubt an expensive thing, but I do not see how cost of carriage can account for one being forced to pay from fifty to seventy per cent, on Dunedin prices for our groceries. Co-operation would soon bring this down, and this need only take the form of a few families clubbing together and getting stores wholesale. Then again, butcher meat i 3 unreasonably high ; but here I would suggest every one should adopt the principle acted on by the Hospital Committee, and call for tenders for the supply of his family, when peril aps he might get it as cheaply as that institution does. Or perhaps, were a sufficient support guaranteed, some enterprising person might commence auction sales of butcher meat similar to those which brought down prices in Dunedin. I hope the matter will be taken up, arid some efforts made to enable a poor man to support his family without running into debt, and so falling into the power of his creditors, who can force him to give far more than the value of his account in labour. — I am, &c,

The Father of a Family. Lawrence, April 21, 1869.