§ 55. Mr. Collinsasked the Minister of Food if he is prepared to adopt the principle of controlled retail profit margins on fruit and vegetables as outlined in a memorandum by the hon. Member for Taunton, in March, 1946, of which a copy has been sent him, with a view to ending the system of exorbitant retail prices for produce for which the growers receive less than the cost of production.
§ Mr. StracheyI have considered this proposal very carefully, as I am most anxious to reduce what certainly strikes one at first sight as the altogether excessive spread between retail and producer prices in fruit and vegetables. But I do not 390 pretend to have come to any conclusions as yet on what ought to be done about it.