§ Mr. Bernaysasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he can give the figures of retail consumption for June, 1939, and June, 1940, or the nearest available date?
§ Sir A. DuncanThere are no figures showing the actual value of retail consumption. Certain traders make returns of their sales to the Bank of England from which the change compared with the corresponding month of the previous year is calculated. For this sample of the trade average daily sales in May, 1940, the latest month available, were 4.5 per 617W cent. higher in value than those in May, 1939. In view of the rise in prices, the volume of goods sold must have been considerably reduced. Detailed particulars were published in the "Board of Trade Journal," dated 4th July.