GREAT POINT GAINED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 207, 1 September 1932, Page 11

GREAT POINT GAINED.

OTTAWA AGREEMENTS. AUSTRALIAN COMMENTS. PROTECTIONISTS APPREHENSIVE. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, August 26. The Ottawa Conference has naturally been an important topic of discussion among people of all classes here during the past weeks, and on the whole it is tsafe to say that the results are, in general terms, regarded as encouraging, and, so far as they go, satisfactory. Of course, the trouble is that they do not go far enough to satisfy most people. The "World," representing Mr. Scullin and the orthodox Labour policy of Protection, is pardonably anxious about , the alterations which Australia may be called upon to make in her tariff later on, to secure a continuance of Britain's cohceseions. The "Labour Daily" can see nothing but evil arising out of the Conference, partly because the scheme was British and "Imperialist," and partly because Australia was represented there by Mr. Bruce, whom it hates with peculiar virulence. The "Labour Daily" lias published a criticism of the various "concessions" in detail, and finds them all either delusive or worthless. But its special pleading is so obviously inspired by partisan" feeling that it counts for little. Other newspapers have published authoritative opinions from many quarters, dealing with the concessions secured on wheat, butter, fruits, cheese, bacon, and expressing satisfaction with all of them. Even in regard to meat, though the amount of mutton and lamb accepted by Britain from Australia is to be regulated by last year's export, and it was found impossible to secure a direct concession on beef, this comparative failure is set off by the restriction now imposed on the im2)ortation of foreign chilled beef into Britain—this , last being regarded as the greatest triumph that Mr. Bruce achieved. Even without full knowledge of the discussions and the various expedients proposed, we may well believe that a direct import duty on meat could not have been imposed by any British Government without gravely compromising its own safety. But if Australia had got more than she has now received, she would certainly have been asked to make sweeping reciprocal concessions by reducing the tariff; and Mr. Bruce can honestly boast that he left Ottawa with our tariff walls still intact. Of course, all these arrangements are subject to readjustment in the future, and many protectionists here are apprehensive about the consequences of further bargaining along these lines. But the great point Sained at the confei'ence is that Britain has been induced at last to accept the principal of Imperial reciprocity and to act uoon it, in her own case, to the extent of granting the Dominions preference over foreigners in her markets on wheat, butter, and other important products, even though this course involves the abandonment of that policy of free imports which she has maintained so long. Compared with this triumphant forward step, the failure of the tariff reformers to secure everything that they asked for or expected is indeed a small matter, and the general opinion of competent authorities here is that the Ottawa Conference of 1032 has marked a definite advance in the economic progress of Britain and the Empire.