THE PRICE OF MILK
SIR,—Your correspondent, Mr. R. H. Morgan, is concerned with facts about milk prices. Here are some for him. He may be able to remember, as many of us do, when milk was delivered to customers at 3d. a quart, and in those times producers were having to pay full local rates on their agricultural land and buildings ; and rents of land were appreciably higher than today. In many country districts where producers are retailing their milk their customers are situated within a short distance of the farm, so that the cost of delivery is infinitesimal compared with the cost of transport to and delivery in the town ; but the country producers maintain the price of 2s. 8d. per gallon.
The commencement of the milk ramp coincided with the coming into existence of the Milk Marketing Board, which has established what is in effect a milk combine, thus making home-produced milk dearer in normal times than in any other European country. The fact that mothers with children under five are able to obtain milk free or at a reduced price has nothing to do with the price charged to the general consumer. The Board has admitted that it is a Producers' Board and is not primarily concerned with retail milk prices except to fix a minimum price, leaving distributors free to charge as much as they like above the minimum. In these circumstances how can it be a fallacy to suggest that the welfare of the consumer has not received proper consideration? It is only too plain that the greater part of the huge price increase in this essential article of food is not due to the increased cost of production or delivery, but to politics.—
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