Fair is Fair Figures, we are often told, can be
used to prove anything. Int announcement that only 2 per cent. of home-produced eggs, and less than 12 per cent. of imported eggs, sold under the new egg. scheme, were bad is an excellent example of how figures can mislead, For this innocent-looking " less than 12 per cent." actually meant, in eight weeks, no fewer than 17,000,000 eggs. One of the saving virtues of the scheme, according to the Ministry of Food, is that it brought eggs to people who had been for some time deprived of eggs. The number of people thus benefited is not stated ; but if it were 17,000,00n (almost half the population) that figure would justify the scheme. But 17,000,000 bad eggs means another 17,000,000 deprived of eggs ; is we cancel- out and are back again in Through the Looking-Glass. However, fair is fair, and the scheme shows decided signs of improve- ment in my district. Our eggs—it appeared quite likely at one time that they had just failed individually to fly the Atlantic—are nos local and not American, and perhaps widespread criticism and the demand for more regionalism in the scheme has had its reward.
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