262^ 



ATMTUR'h^h 



[April 29, 1930 



Thf: ,.^-r>}iU Penny,— A& the denomination 4 repre-. 

 sents , nie^^hier .9 decimal multiple of i nor a binary 

 divisi^ .of . ^o, a 4-mil coin could have no permanent 

 place in any decimal coinage system. As a transitional 

 value it , would also be unattractive, • because it would 

 still further reduce the purchasing power of the penny 

 at a tiin.e, when an increase is needed, and its tem- 

 porary 9^option would involve two adjustments of 

 existiag, pennyworths, thus doubling, instead of remov- 

 ing, the difficulty. For these and other reasons a 4-mil 

 penny may be safely dismissed from our consideration. 



The ^-mil Penny. — There are at least four good 

 reasons in its favour, viz. : 



(i) In a decimal coinage system prices are normally 

 arranged in steps of 5, e.g. 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, etc., and 

 the value of c mils would fall conveniently between 

 that of the unduly high 5 American cents and the un- 

 necessarily low 5 centimes of the Latin Union. 



(2) TJie reduction of the present high prices would 

 be hastened by the provision of a penny of this value. 

 The price of a pre-war pennyworth, now sold at three- 

 halfpence, could obviously be reduced to 5 mils long 

 before it could be restored, if ever, to the original 

 penny. 



(3) The prevailing shortage of copper coins would 

 be relieved by thus increasing the token values of all 

 the penny and halfpenny coins now in circulation. 

 Two copper coins are now employed in countless 

 transactions where formerly one sufficed, and this fact 

 alone, quite apart from decimalisation, demands a 

 penny of higher value. 



(4) The simple relationship of 10 pence to the 

 shilling would be readily grasped by the uneducated, 

 and the deservedly popular single-coin payments would 

 be restored. Retail shopkeepers could, if so desired, 

 continue to keep their accounts In £ s. d. instead of 

 £ f. m., the 2|, 5, 10, and 25 mil coins being in that 

 case entered as hi, 2, and 5 pence, all the higher 

 value coins retaining their present descriptions as 

 I, 2, 5, and 10 shillings respectively. 



Note. — ^The majority Commissioners apparently 

 feared that 5 mils would always be charged in place 

 of the present penny. If they had said in place of 

 the present three-halfpence, they would have been just 

 as near the truth, which possibly lies between these 

 two views. Probably everyone would now be very 

 glad to pay 5 mils for a pre-war pennyworth of any- 

 thing—the trouble is we are charged three-halfpence 

 or more. When introducing this year's Budget "the 

 Chancellor of the Exchequer (referring to his pro- 

 posal to raise the receipt duties from id. to 2d.) said : 

 "This change is no more than reflecting the altered 

 value of the penny." 



The 4^-wt7 Penny.— If there are insuperable difficul- 

 ties in the way of raising the values of the existing 

 penny and halfpenny coins to make them serve as 

 tokens for 5 mils and 2^ mils respectively, they could 

 remain in circulation at their present values side by 

 side with new 5-mil nickel coins, in which event their 

 values in mils could be expressed as 4-2 and 2-1 

 respectively, the latter figure representing twelfths of 

 a mil. (These expressions would be no worse than 

 our present use of 4/2 to represent four shillings and 

 two-twelfths.) 



The present penny could thus be preserved in- 

 definitely for the continued exact payment of all 

 statutory pennyworths, but the competition of the 

 smaller, lighter, and cleaner 5-mil nickel coin, repre- 

 senting a value in closer harmony with present-day 

 needs, would rapidly drive the bronze pennv out of 

 popular favour for the countless single-coin payments 

 of daily life. In concluding that this method might 

 involve the dual circulation of pence and mils "for 

 seventy-five years or more," the majority Commis- 

 sioners have unwarrantably assumed that no steps 



NO. 2635, VOL. 105] 



would be taken by the established "penny " interests, 

 such as insurance and tramway authorities, etc.-, to 

 bring themselves into line with the new mil system, 

 whereas many of these interests are already agitating 

 for legislative authority to abandon the penny basis, 

 which has proved inadequate to cover operating costs. 

 Many of the old fixed penny charges, such as the 

 penny stamp, penny-a-mile, etc., have already dis- 

 appeared, and the retention of the coin itself is no 

 longer a matter of vital importance. 



The £ sterling could thus be decimalised either 

 without altering the penny or by raising its value to 

 5 mils (either instantaneously or gradually), and so 

 securing substantial benefits over and above those 

 normally arising from decimalisation. 



Having very truly said : " It is necessary to distin- 

 guish between the coins in circulation and the reckon- 

 ing of money of account," and having properly 

 referred to the human habit of halving quantities, the. 

 Commissioners failed to realise that it is quite prac- 

 ticable to combine the advantages of decimal accounts 

 and binarv coins. Such a composite scheme would 

 provide decimal multiples and binary divisions thus : 



The above proposal achieves the complete decimalisa- 

 tion of the £ by means of a smaller number of coins 

 and in a simpler manner than by the method described 

 in Lord Southwark's Bill. No decimal point would 

 be needed, the number of figures would be reduced, 

 and no new coins would be immediately required. 



Harry Allcock. 



Trafford Park, Manchester, April 21. 



international Council for Fishery Investigations. 



As the writer of the article on the above subject 

 in Nature of March 18, I should be disposed to allow 

 Prof. Mcintosh's letter in the issue of April 8 based 

 on it to pass without comment if that letter had not 

 been quoted extensively elsewhere. I merely remark 

 that the professor's claim to maintain the same posi- 

 tion as he took up in his published criticisms in 1902 

 and 1903 is fully substantiated. I see no reference in my 

 article to the Moray Firth, which, indeed, had nothing 

 to do with the International Council, and which I 

 must leave Prof. Mcintosh to settle with his fishery 

 colleagues in Scotland. His criticism of the repre- 

 sentatives of France is out of place, in that repre- 

 sentatives of all countries are appointed by their 

 Governments. 



Prof. Mcintosh confuses the programme adopted 

 with the general discussion which took place first. 

 Commodore Drechsel and others spoke of "the 

 closure of . the greater part of the North Sea as the 

 most gigantic scientific expenment ever made [will 



