§ LORD HANKEYMy Lords, I beg to ask the question standing in my name.
§ [The question was as follows:
§ To ask His Majesty's Government (1) what is the present extraction rate of the flour used in the national bread resulting from the mixture of 8o per cent, and 75 per cent. flour in the proportions for England and Scotland respectively as stated in the Earl of Listowel's answer to my question on May 2nd (Parliamentary Debates, House of Lords, Vol. 136, No. 49, Cols. 155 and 156): (2) what is the mineral content of the composite loaf: and (3) what was the corresponding content of the 85 per cent. loaf.]
VISCOUNT CLIFDENMy Lords, I have beep asked to reply. In England, Wales and Northern Ireland the present overall extraction of national flour for bread-making, allowing for the addition of Canadian imported flour, is 79.25 per cent. The same figure also applies to Scotland, except for batch bread, where it may fall to 78.6 per cent. The only minerals for which routine analyses are carried out are calcium and iron. For these two elements the average contents in either the English or the Scotch loaf are approximately 610 and 12.5 parts per million respectively. The loaf which contained 85 per cent. extraction home-produced flour also contained Canadian imported flour, and the corresponding figures were 620 and 17 parts per million.