OTHER PEOPLE’S IDEAS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 June 1942, Page 2

OTHER PEOPLE’S IDEAS

THE PRICE OF FRUIT (To the Editor.) Sir, —It was very pleasing to read the remarks of our worthy M.P. anent the price of oranges and lemons, etc., —that is if such was not a waste of time. Tonight’s prices in Queen Street, Masterton, are: Lemons, sd; marmalade oranges, sd; bananas, 9d and lOd, or say 3d each for unripe fruit. The reason for these high prices is something the average family man has a right to know. The shop owner states the poorgrower only gets a few pence per dozen and the shop little or no profit, but who gets the three to four hundred per cent, profit? Probably a general boycott by one and all is the only answer, or perhaps Mr Robertson will take the matter a step further and explain why, from the purchaser’s point of view, things are so rotten in the fruit trade. —I am, etc., P. H. SHAW. Masterton, June 22. BLACKOUT RESTRICTIONS (To the Editor) Sir, —The Controller’s reply to my inquiry re above is interesting if not helpful. As a bewildered citizen I will concede his remarks “that no one in this district had been asked to do anything that was not in the regulations.” The point still arises as to why these regulations are so rigorously applied to an inland town, while the same regulations are interpreted with a wider discretion in coastal and more important centres than Masterton. Surely these regulations were framed for the guidance only of controllers and any modification which may be allowed in the interest of the public would not constitute a glaring breach of such regulations. It certainly looks a case of red tape once again, but where regulations were framed to meet all emergencies of those areas definitely within the danger zone, it does not follow that they be applied in their entirety to our inland towns. I am of opinion that the public of Masterton should strongly protest before we have some serious accidents under the present conditions obtaining.—l am, etc., CITIZEN. Masterton, June 22.