Page 372 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

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The Story of the CW.S.
of purchases for use in production, have grown from 471,774 cwts. in
1880 to 3,084,540 cwts. in 1912. In other words, the Wholesale
Society has organised the buying, through one channel, of an amount
of sugar equal to one pound every week for 6| million people, or
one-sixth of the population of England and Wales. Such sales
naturally have suggested the further step of refuiing. This was
considered a few years ago, but, for the time being, with negative
results. It was evident that if refining were to be done at all it must
be on a great scale, and at more than one centre. This, in any case,
would make for caution; and there remained a further point. So
large a buyer has the respect of the refineries of the world, and, with
possible sources of supply in different countries, can afford to risk
what is at present the remote danger of a sugar trust. As a
commodity sugar fluctuates in price, sometimes violently. The
wholesale price at one time in March, 1912, exceeded that of a
particular week in the following November by one-third. These
changes, of course, are watched, tabulated, and reported upon to
the C.W.S. Committee by the buyers acting on behalf of the
co-operative consumers. . . . This professional watchfulness
over prices as they affect the two million co-operative housewives
has necessarily taken account of the duties upon sugar. In 1900
there was no impost. In 1901 the war tax of 4s. 2d. per cwt. was
levied, and in 1908 was maintained at Is. lOd. per cwt. The entire
amount paid since 1901 by the Enghsh and Scottish Wholesale
Societies under this head, at the end of December, 1912, had reached
the total of £6,308,042 ; and the accumulating figures from time to
time have been put before different Chancellors of the Exchequer.
This very mild form of pohtical action has contamed no new
principle, for in 1889 a paper upon " The Proposed Sugar Convention
From a Consumer's Point of View " was read by the then sugar
buyer, Mr. I. Tweedale. The proposal was embodied in a BiU
introduced into the House of Commons by Baron de Worms, and the
protest made was so effective that Lord (then ]\'Ir. John) Morley,
speaking at Rochdale, credited the co-operative movement with
having decided the case against the Bill.
Occasion has wan^anted, also, the compilation of statistics bearing
upon the cost of living. In February, 1913, such a comparison
was made between 1898 and different years up to 1912. Bacon and
hams, butter, cheese, flour, lard, meal, sugar, and tea formed the
basis of the inquiry, and the statistics revealed an increase of 16'33
per cent over 1898. Reduced to homely terms, in the shape of a
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