§ MR. TREVELYAN (Yorkshire, W.R., Elland)I beg to ask the President of the Board of Trade whether he will grant the Return of Corn Prices, notice of which stands on to-day's Paper.
§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE (Mr. GERALD BALFOUR,) Leeds, CentralI regret that I cannot grant this Return. The matter has been carefully considered in consultation with the Board of Agriculture, and it is found that part of the information desired cannot be supplied, and that the compilation of the remainder would involve great labour without yielding a satisfactory result.
Appended is the Return referred to:—
Return of (1) the average monthly price for each month of the years 1875 to 1903 of wheat, maize, barley, oats, and rye, at the following producing places, specifying in the case of wheat the accompanying standards: New York, No. 2 red winter wheat; Chicago, No. 2 red winter, wheat; Montreal, No. 1 hard Manitoban wheat; Buenos Ayres, Standard Plate wheat; Bombay, No. 1 Bombay wheat; Calcutta, No. 2 Club Calcutta; and at the following consuming places, specifying the above standards in the case of wheat: Liverpool, London, Hull, Havre, Marseilles, Paris, Hamburg, Berlin, Barcelona, Madrid, Amsterdam, and Antwerp; the prices to be calculated per 112 lbs. English, and to be the market price, and not the official values; the taxed and untaxed returns to be given at ports where both are mentioned; and (2) the tariff in operation at each period in each place.