§ 67. Mr. Collinsasked the Minister of Food if he will now announce his proposals regarding price control of homegrown apples.
§ Dr. SummerskillMy right hon. Friend has decided to free home-grown apples from price control from 1st August to 31st October this year, provided that prices remain at reasonable levels throughout. We hope to do the same for pears later in August, if the crop is good.
Mr. Amoryasked the Minister of Food whether he is aware that, during the past two years, imports of foreign apples during the marketing of the home-grown crop have resulted in waste; and whether, with a view to avoiding such waste in future, he will arrange for the bulk of imports of apples to arrive when homegrown apples are no longer available.
§ Mr. StracheyApart from the small supplies of dessert apples imported from the Continent during the winter months, every effort is made to ensure that the supplies imported from the Southern Dominions during the summer months reach this country and are distributed well before the home-grown crop is ready for marketing. In 1948 and again this year, there have been unexpected delays in arrivals through circumstances quite outside my control, but these belated arrivals, as also the foreign supplies to which I have referred, are quite insufficient in quantity to cause any waste in the home crop.