§ Mr. Hamiltonasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the import price index for food in each year since 1947, taking that year as 100; and what was the average retail price index for food in each of those years.
§ Mr. MaudlingThere is no series which measures the changes in price of the same collection of imports of food over the period from 1947 to 1953. The index of average values of food, beverages and tobacco, shown below, gives a rough measure of changes in price from year to year, but is affected by changes in the relative quantities of different foods, etc., being imported.
106W
1947 … … … … 100 1948 … … … … 109 1949 … … … … 110 1950 … … … … 122 1951 … … … … 140 1952 … … … … 146 1953 … … … … 140 The index for food in the interim index of retail prices with 17th June, 1947, as 100, has moved as follows:
Average, 1948 … … 108 Average, 1949 … … 114 Average, 1950 … … 123 Average, 1951 … … 136 15th January, 1952 … … 150 In January, 1952, certain changes were made in the method of calculating the index, and the index for food after that date is not comparable with the figures above. On the new basis, with 15th January, 1952, as 100, the index for food moved as follows:
Average, 1952 … … 105 Average, 1953 … … 111 The relative importance of different foods in the nation's import bill differs considerably from their relative importance in retail sales, because of the varying proportion of home production, the varying incidence of subsidies and of processing and distributive costs, the varying time lag between import and sale, and many other factors. Hence there is no reason to expect the changes in the two indices to be comparable.