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30. It is possible that the person making that statement has compared the wholesale price at Home with the retail price here? —He may have compared the price of the whole animal at Home with the price for a certain cut or joint here. 31. The Chairman.] Have you any statement that you would care to make, bearing upon the question of the cost of living, that may not have arisen in the course of the questions which you have been asked ?—I think the cost of living has risen. 32. Can you give us what you consider is the cause of that? —There are many causes, i think there is a higher standard of living—that a higher standard of living is demanded by all. There is also the increase in wages. I think also that the higher cost of production has been brought about not only by the increase in wages, but by the general tendency to give less work for a given wage. 33. You think there is such a tendency?— Yes, most certainly. Edward Thomas Recce, Secretary of Messrs. E. Recce and Sons (Limited), Hardware Merchants, examined on oath. (No. 49.) 1. The Chairman.] Are you well acquainted with the hardware business? —Yes. I have had seventeen years' experience of it. 2. Is it within your knowledge that the price of hardware has increased during that time? —No, I think as a general rule it has decreased. 3. To what do you attribute that? —Principally to improvements in manufacturing methods. 4. If the improvement in the manufacture has caused a cheapening in the wholesale prices, does the consumer reap the full benefit of that cheapness in production?— Yes, they do; but at the same time they are generally demanding a better article than they did formerly. They are not satisfied with goods required for the fitting up of houses of the kind that people used years ago. 5. Still, in proportion, the cost is cheaper?— Yes, on ordinary every-day lines, such as the general public buy. Of course, metals like iron and goods of the heavy class are ruled by the rise and fall of the market. The price is a fluctuating one always. 6. You mean the rise in the price of raw material?— Yes; usually we find in the trade that the price ruling at Home for iron is the basis of everything. If iron is high, other things rise correspondingly. 7. Does the retail price rise in fair proportion to the wholesale price?—lt depends on the rise. Some rises may only last for a few weeks and go back again; then, as a rule, the retail prices remain stationary, because, in a general way, retailers do not raise prices in such cases. 8. Does your firm buy directly from Home?—-Yes. 9. Do all the hardware-merchants here buy in that way?— Yes, the majority do, I think. 10. There are no lines in your business controlled by any arrangement amongst the merchants here?— No. Of course, there has to be in all businesses a certain amount of unanimity with regard to raising prices on a rising market, just the same as the manufacturers at Home do if it is necessary. They have to contend with the same conditions of labour there, and that sort of thing, as we have here. 11. Could you give us any idea of how that regulation of prices is carried out? Are minutes of the meetings taken, or is there a signed agreement?—No, there is not anything of that sort. If there is any marked advance in prices, as there is at the present time, owing to the labour troubles, three or four of the merchants perhaps confer and agree to raise prices. 12. And do the others fall into line?— Yes. 13. Mr. Veitch.] Does that same principle apply here—merchants meeting together and deciding in that way?— Yes, I was speaking of both. At both ends of the world we have the same thing to contend against. If bar iron, for instance, is raised 10s. a ton at Home, there is an increase to a corresponding amount here. 14. Then, do the merchants here carry out that same principle?— Yes. 15. Suppose you find there is a rise in the price of iron such as you describe at Home, of course it naturally costs you more to import your iron here. How would you go about determining what price should be fixed: would you hold a conference with other merchants? —We would simply suggest to one or two firms interested that the price be advanced in accordance with the cost, and then the trade would naturally follow suit. 16. The Chairman.} Would a circular be issued to the other merchants?— No. 17. It is just a verbal understanding? —Yes. 18. Mr. Veitch.] Is there anything to prevent you doing that even if there was not any rise in the price in the Old Country?—The only thing to prevent it is that we have too much competition. 19. Have you absolutely free competition? —Yes, we have competition from every town, and if our prices here were too high people from Wellington and other places would immediately come in. 20. Is there no arrangement between the merchants here and the merchants in other cities 1 — None whatever. 21. Is there an association of merchants here? —No, there is simply the arrangement I have told you of in the case of an advance or a reduction in prices. It is necessary to have some unanimity with regard to the selling-prffces. 22. You confer with other merchants as to the prices?— Yes. 23. And you agree that there is nothing to prevent that being done even if there is not any rise in the prices at Home? —Simply competition prevents that. 24. To what extent does this understanding exist between you and the other merchants? Are there no meetings of merchants held to arrange the prices or to decrease prices?— Occasionally