On Tuesday night -the - permanent joint committee of the farmers
and the dairy trade settled the milk dispute. The prices agreed upon are Is. 5d. a gallon for four months, is. 4d. a gallon for four months, and is. a gallon for four months. The distributors announced that the retail price would be 7d. a quart for eight months and 6d. a quart for four months. The agreement is to last for a yeAr, beginning on October 1st. Thus the farmers have gained an increase on the present prices. They had demanded an increase of .11 /12ths of Id. a gallon, and the dairy trade offered 4 /12ths of a id. The hitch of last week therefore concerned 7 /12ths of a Id. The agreement of Tuesday gives the farmers 5 /12ths out of the 7/12ths. To put it in another way, the dairy trade offered 14s. 7(1' a gallon for the whole year and has now agreed to give 15s. a gallon for the whole year—an average of Is. 3d. a month. As for the consumer, he will have to pay a higher price for two months in the year.
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