The annual meeting of the Co-operative Congress opened at Stratford
on Monday, and was attended by 1,500 delegates. Mr. E. 0. Greening, who delivered the inaugural address, illustrated the growth of the movement by some remarkable statistics. The business controlled reached an annual total of £89,000,000; there were 2,116,127 members registered in 1,701 societies ; the capital invested in their various societies amounted to £37,158,239; and the net profits for 1903 reached the remarkable figure of £9,873,385, or three and a half times the percentage of net profit made upon the whole commerce of the country under ordinary conditions. Turning to the Fiscal question, he earnestly hoped that we had left the days of Protection, Preferential tariffs, and Retaliatory duties behind us for ever. As Co-operators they were politically neutral, but the proposal to tax food was one of the political questions which touched them closely, as food formed three-fourths of the staple material of the business of the societies, and no body of British working men would sanction it. In con- clusion, he asked the Congress to abandon all thoughts of direct Parliamentary representation, which would necessarily mean using for sectional and party purposes funds and influence with which they were entrusted by men of all parties and all opinions.
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