asked the Minister for Supplies if, with reference to the statement published in the Press to the effect that the additional 20 per cent. extraction from wheat would not in fact mean a ½d. reduction in the 4 lb. loaf, he is aware that, in effect, it means a reduction of 5/- in the sack or two-thirds of a penny in the 4 lb. loaf; and if he will consider reducing the price of bread by this amount; or, if he intends to use the reduction to build up a reserve fund, whether he is aware that by the end of August, 1941, at a consumption of 250,000 sacks per month, that fund will have grown at the rate of £62,500 per month to £437,500.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Price of Loaf.
The Deputy has apparently misinterpreted the statement which appeared in the Press recently. This statement made reference to the price of bread following on the increase in the extraction of flour from 80 per cent. to 90 per cent., and not from 70 per cent. Consequently, the figures quoted in the question appear to be based on a miscalculation.
Is the Minister not aware that the present price of bread is based on a flour extraction of 70 per cent., and was fixed by him at 52/6 per sack or £21 per ton? About the 1st February we had added to the flour 20 per cent. of offals, which then sold at £11 10s. per ton.
That is not correct. I have just explained to the Deputy that he is wrong in that.
How?
The increase was from 80 per cent. to 90 per cent. and not from 70 per cent.
At first it was 70 per cent.
The Minister cannot deny the fact that the price of flour was fixed by him when the standard extraction of flour was 70 per cent.
Hear, hear!
Since that time — at 70 per cent. and not at 80 per cent. extraction — when he fixed the price of flour, there has been added 20 per cent. offals. These offals were sold — I bought them myself — at £11 10s. per ton. That was up to the first week in February. Now the relation of 70 to 20 is as three and a half to one. If you take three and a half tons at £21 per ton, and one ton at £11 10s., you get a mixture which should sell at £18 17s. 9d. per ton. The difference between £21 per ton and £18 17s. 9d. is £2 2s. 3d. — in other words, 42/3. That means 5/3 per sack. As the Minister knows, there are eight sacks in a ton, so that the difference of 42/3 means in round figures 5/3 per sack of flour. Therefore, a reduction of 5/3 in the price of the sack of flour should mean to the baker and to the public a reduction of two-thirds of a penny in the 4-lb. loaf. I want to know from the Minister why the public is not getting the benefit of that? There is no use in telling us that the price of bread did not go up since the war started. We know the reason — that very little imported wheat came into the country.
The Deputy might put his supplementary.
I am asking the Minister why this reduction of 5/3 in the sack of flour is not being passed on to the public in the 4-lb. loaf?
The answer to the Deputy's question is that the financial effect of increasing the extraction from 70 to 80 per cent. prevented an increase in the price of flour at the time. No doubt, some Deputies opposite are not aware that there is a war on, and that as a result of the war——
Yes, but the profiteers have not stopped profiteering.
——there has been a very considerable increase in the cost of imported wheat in this country. In these circumstances, increases, and substantial increases, in the price of flour have only been avoided with great difficulty. One of the methods of avoiding them last year was the increase in the extraction from 70 to 80 per cent.
And another was to increase the price of bran by £3 per ton.
I quite accept what the Minister says, but I do not think that the existence of a war can interfere with the basic elements of arithmetic. The prices I quoted are the prices which prevailed in the first week in February, and the war did not aggravate the position since that period. Would the Minister consider this matter with a view——
The Deputy is, I think, president of the Master Bakers' Association. Will he assure me that if we reduce the price of flour by 2/- per sack, the master bakers will decrease the price of bread?
As the Minister very well knows, the master bakers are tied by a formula, and, up to the time the war broke out, the bakers were the only persons in Ireland who were selling a Ministerially-controlled product. He knows very well that, if the price of flour goes up or down, willy-nilly the price of bread will be altered accordingly.
The alternative is to give increased profits to the bakers. I am not going to do it.
That is not true.
In view of what he has stated, will the Minister now say——
Deputy O'Neill is in possession.
I deprecate that statement by the Minister, but I am not going to enter into a controversy of that type. I ask him if, on the figures I have quoted, he sees any reason why he should not pass on that two-thirds of a penny advantage to the public?
Will the Minister say, in view of what he has now stated, whether he has deliberately withheld from the public any power of knowing whether, and to what extent, the price of imported wheat has risen in this country?
I do not think that is correct.
Is the Minister not aware that both he and the Minister for Industry and Commerce refused to allow the public to know the amount of wheat imported into this country and the import price of it?
I think the Deputy will have to allow the Government to exercise their discretion as to what it is desirable to publish in the public interest. The Government have some responsibility.
Have they?
Does the Minister, while stating as a kind of answer to the questions put to him that the price of imported wheat has risen, still stand on the ground of declining to let the public know the extent to which it has risen?
With regard to the Minister's statement that the alternative is to give more profits to the bakers by reducing the price of flour by 2/6d., is it not a fact that the price of flour can increase by 3/6 without any increase in the price of bread, and that such has taken place?
And can go down.
Is it not a fact that the price of bread cannot be increased until the price of flour increases by 4/- per sack?
That is not so. The points are 50/- and 53/-. If flour falls below 50/-, a decrease is justifiable, and if it rises above 53/-, an increase is justifiable. The present price is 52/6d.
The point I am making is that if the price of flour goes up by 4/-, the Master Bakers can put a ½d. on the 4-lb. loaf?
It need go up only 6d. on the present price.
If it goes up by 3/6d., the price of bread is not increased. Is it not to the millers that all the profit is going?
I have tried to explain to the Deputy — and he will not understand — that a difference of 4/- in the price of flour would justify a difference in the price of bread. I must relate the facts to the present price of flour. The present price is 52/6. An increase in the price of bread would be justifiable if it passes 53/-, and a decrease would be justifiable if it goes below 50/-. We are holding it at 52/6.
If you brought it down by 2/9, you could reduce the price of bread.
Ask Deputy O'Neill about that.
Ask me about it.
Might I ask the Minister if he has seen a Ministerial statement which appeared this morning? That statement said:
"Causes outside the control of this community are operating to drive up prices. If elements within the community were to drive the general price level higher the situation would become intolerable."
Has the Minister any comment to make on that in relation to his refusal to give the public the advantage of the 5/3½?
There is no question of 5/3½. There is a question of a sum of about 2/-. We could reduce the price of flour by 2/- per sack by reason of the increase in the extraction from 80 to 90 per cent. That would not permit of a decrease in the price of bread.
Bring it into Dáil Eireann and let us debate it.
I think that is what we are doing now.
Bring it in in an orderly fashion and let us debate it.
The Deputy could not show a stone wall to a blind man.
I could show the Minister some sense which he badly needs.