§ LORD HINDLIP had the following Question on the Paper—
§ To ask His Majesty's Government if any decision has been arrived at as to the price, wholesale and retail, for the sale of milk for the summer months, commencing on 1st May.
§ The noble Lord said: My Lords, I put this Question on the Paper of your Lordships' House for one day last week. At the request of the Ministry of Food I postponed it until to-day, but I was again requested at a late hour yesterday afternoon, to postpone it until next week. In these circumstances I do not propose to press the Question this afternoon but to put it down for next Tuesday.
§ I would like, however, to enter as strong a protest as I can against the delay occasioned by the Ministry of Food in not announcing milk prices. Such a course upsets all markets and all kinds of trade in milk and milk products, besides the trade in cows and other cattle. I have no doubt that the Ministry of Food will say that they have appointed a Commission, and that, owing to the time that body has taken in getting evidence and coming to a conclusion, they have not been able to decide the prices. That is no excuse at all. The Commission ought to have been appointed two months earlier than it was. We shall also be told no doubt that it is possibly the fault of my noble friend the President of the Board of Agriculture; but as the Ministry of Food are always trying to put the blame on the Board I am sure that argument will carry no weight here, and I trust that the Ministry of Food will really not attempt to use that argument.
§ I have a very shrewd suspicion that something, about which we do not know, lies behind this. I am very suspicious of the delay in announcing prices, and I think that when your Lordships' House meets again we shall have to try to extract a little more information from the Ministry of Food as to why this delay has taken place.
289§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (LORD ERNLE)My Lords. I have been asked by the Ministry of Food to answer this Question. The noble Lord has correctly stated that the first postponement of it was due to the fact that a travelling commission on milk had been appointed in January, and that it had not at the time reported. The second postponement is due practically to the same cause. That commission met for the first time, I believe, on January 16. It held twenty meetings in different parts of the country and it sent in its report on April 8. Under the system which the Food Controller adopts the question of fixing the minimum price has to be submitted to a Committee. Their recommendations go to a Consumers' Council, and then I believe as a rule they are referred to an Agricultural Advisory Committee. That takes time, and as the Report was only received on April 8, and as the Minister of Food and his officials have hardly yet had time to make up their minds upon the recommendations made by that Committee, this second postponement is asked for and the Minister of Food desires me to say that he hopes to be able to announce a decision on Tuesday next.
The question is one of very considerable complexity. It involves fixing a maximum price in the first place, it involves a question whether that price should be graded to meet the different periods of the year for which it is effective, and also questions whether there should be differential rates according to the localities, whether if those differential rates are adopted there exists the machinery to make them effective, or whether that machinery can be improvised. There is the still further and in my opinion the most important question of all, whether there should be in addition to a maximum price a parity price fixed for cheese. Therefore it is no easy problem, and I have only to give the official explanation of the delay.