§ Mr. Severasked the Secretary of State for Prices and Consumer Protection whether he will make a statement about implementation of the recommendations made by the Monopolies Commission in its report in 1974 on the supply of plasterboard.
§ Mr. John FraserOn 31st March last year my predecessor announced to the House that after negotiations with the Director General of Fair Trading, BPB Industries Ltd. which, through its subsidiary company British Gypsum Ltd., 683W has a complete monopoly in the supply of plasterboard in the United Kingdom, was willing to give undertakings in respect of all three of the recommendations in the Monopolies Commission report on the supply of plasterboard.
Implementation of the two recommendations relating to the introduction of delivered prices and direct customer collections would have conflicted with the Price Code then in operation. However, in the light of subsequent amendments to the code, the company has since submitted undertakings to my right hon. Friend relating to these two recommendations which will be implemented as soon as discussions between the company and the Price Comission have been completed. I understand that these are far advanced and I will make a further announcement in due course.
The third recommendation, that BPB should permit major users of plasterboard to buy their supplies direct, without being required to purchase through a merchant, was implemented in March last year. One of the terms of this undertaking was that any customer wishing to buy direct from BPB rather than a builder's merchant should have purchased a minimum of 100,000 sq. metres of plasterboard in the previous year. The Commission had not specified a minimum annual purchase level in its report but it had considered that in principle such a condition was reasonable as only the larger builders and contractors would wish to make use of direct account facilities. BPB estimated that approximately 100 plasterboard users in the United Kingdom purchased 100,000 sq. metres or more per year. It was agreed that this threshold figure would be re
Year ended 31st December 1975 Year ended 31st December 1976 England and Wales … … … … … … 43,428 53,819 Scotland … … … … … … … 2,250 2,266 45,678 56,085 No other geographical division of registrations is recorded.