To the Editor of the Norra-Cuina Dairy News.'*
8im,—It appears to me thata great deal of unnecessary criticism is being at present thrown upon the Homeward Freight Conference, amounting—when all the correspondence in your columns is fairly construed—to an attack upon the Conference for reasons best knowm to your correspondents themselves.
During normal times the Conference proved by itself instead of being a nuisance as was sometimes thought and restraint to British trade that it was actually a great convenience to shippers and steadied trade conditions enormously by the supply of regular tonnage and above all the steady rates of freight ruling from one year's end to the other through the fixity of minimum rates, At the present time when tonnage is so scarce and rates of freight throughout the world are so high and upset, it must be obvious to any merchant with half an idea of business that he cannot in such abnormal times expect either export or import business to be anything other than of a grossly speculative nature.
Ab present the Conference does not appear to be in the least acting in restraint of British Trade, may be very inconvenient and OF
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.