Minutes of Evidence p.1401-1509 - Parliament of Victoria

1441
the ld. is taken off, the miners might get the ld. for prospecting with. They might get it for many other The Honomble
'Ihomas Loader,
purposes ; they might not get it at all ; it depends upon the state of the market entirely.
con#nueil,
48753. It l;llight be mopped up by the importers ?-It might.
2nd May, 1883.
48754. At any rate your company would have to close its canclle works utterly, and leave the market
to the importers '?-I have not the slightest doubt every candle company would stop.
48755. By Mr. Zvru.-You say you often pay a certain amount of duties in your trade with regret;
can you tell the Commission what those duties are that you pay upon the articles that you use in your
business ?-Machinery. Sometimes we have to import machinery that we cannot get made here, and we
have to pay duty upon it.
48756. Is that the only article ; is there any raw material that you use in the manufacture of
candles, upon which yo,u have to pay a duty, that is not produced in this country·?-I do not remember that
we do pay upon anything ; machinery happened to be uppermost in my mind because we had been recently
paying it.
48757. You do not know. of any other article?-No, I do not know of much duty upon other
things.
48758. Is the machinery upon which you pay duty patent machinery ?-No.
48759. Could the articles of machinery, which you use in your business, be made in the colony ?-It
could, a[ter we had once got the pattern here; hut the machinory generally is new to us, and is generally
ordered from plans and pattern books which we see; but after we have once got the machinery here we can
generally get it made upon the spot, and very often we get it made to a great advantage.
48760. But suppose you do not import the machinery from England, would it be absolutely necessary
for you to get it manufactured in this coumry ?-Yes, we must either get it made here or import it, I think.
48761. Would the difference in price be very much ?-~The difference in price is not the whole thing,
there is a difference in quality as well. In some c:tses the difference in price would not prevent us from
having it made here if we could get the right quality made here. Some of our materials are made of cast
iron, and the quality of' the metal used here by the foundries for making that particular descl'iption of steel
pots, that we require, is not good enough; they have not got the proper metals to make the proper mixture,
and we are obliged to import those articles from Scotland.
48762. Bnt, taking into consideration the difference in price you have to pay and the difference in
the quality you mention, suppose you put it into a percentage, could you give the Commission any idea. of
the percentage there would be between the colonial-made article and the English ?-I coulcl not. Allow
me to explain the impossibility of doing so. Baircl metal ici no good at tLll for such a purpose as a steel
pot for you may have a large charge of valuable contents in a still and it may go at a most unexpected
time, before it has been in use a month, or two perhaps. A good steel pot made ot' proper metal will last
for years, and you may work with the utmost security, so that no percentage would represent the difference
between a bad steel pot and a good one, and th!tt class of metal is not understood by common founders .who
are right enough in making a common casting; they have not either the experience or the metal for it.
48763. Since we have establish-ed the manufacture in the colony, has it been an advantage or
otherwise to the consumers, with the duty on, as far as English prices are concerned?-Ut,terly irrespective
of my being interested in candle making, from a pmctical point of view I consider the consumer has benefited
immensely by the existence of these fn,ctories.
48764. If the duty then were taken off to-morrow and the English candles were to come in free,
would the consumer be able to purchase at a higher or a lower price than at present ?-The consumer would
be subject to the establishment of candle rings and the fluctuations of the market, and they would pay a
high price; probably they would be paying Is. 6d. a pound at this moment for candles.
48765. You heard the evidence of Mr. Kitchen about the existence of combinations in the tradedo
you agree with that ?-Yes, I agree with him. There is a combination between us or we should be
cutting each other's throats, ns we have done more than once.
48766. Have you any objection to state the nature of that combination r-Wben tallow rises or
falls, we meet and have a few words-" Do you consider we can go on as we are, or ought candles to be
raised or lowered?'' and the whole thing is done in a few minutes. vYe consider whether we can rise or
fall according to the tallow market .
.· 48767. At these interviews, is there a price settled between the various candle makers of the colony?
__;There are but two of us.
48768. And the two of you do it?-Yes, we make agreements-but we do not always keep them.
48769. Is that fair ?-It depends upon which does it.
48770. By M1·. Mclnty1·e.-If the importers did it, what would it be considered ?-It would be con-
. sidered a market combination. .
48771. If the manufacturers do it it is not a market combination?-It is a market combination; it is
done all over the world.
48772. The Chairma,n just asked you about a man who gave evideu~e at Fryerstown, and you said
that this opinion that the ld. a pound would be a benefit to the miners was a vague one. No doubt it is
vague, but is it not natural to him to think that they would get the benefit '?-It is natural enough.
48773. You did not pay any attention to that particular part of his evidence wherein he sahl that it
was the general report that you exported an article to Sydney and sold it there at Id. a pound less than you
did here. Is there any truth in that statement ?__;I must repmliate the statement, because the man, I still
say, does not know what he is talking about.
48774. But you know that an impression prevails ?-Yes, I know that an impression of that sort
prevails.
48775. You have heard it stated many times r-Very many times. .
48776. Will you explain the facts of your exportation to Sydney and the price you sell at there as
compared with your price here ?-That impost of lcl. a pound has preyvented us doing it. ·
48777. That is latelv ?-Yes.
48778. But before that ?--When the tallow runs llown to £2·i, £26, £28 per ton, we could manufacture
steal'ine at a very much lower price than we can when tallow is anything over £30, up to £36 as it
is now. At the lower prices it was within our .powcl' to manufacture ~tearine greatly in excess of the
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