PROTECTION.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18516, 19 October 1925, Page 9

PROTECTION.

TARIFF TREND IN BRITAIN. | WORSTED TRADE IMPORT j DUTIES. : (BT CABLE—rEESS ASSOCIATION-COPTSIGH?.'! (ACST&ALIAS ASD S.Z. CABLI ASSOCIATION) LONDON, October 10. Yorkshire newspapers regard the application of the Safeguarding of Industries Committee for the imposition of worsted import duties as epoch-making, as it may lead to protection for the first time-in the history of modern woo] manufacture. The "Yorkshire Post'' says: '-'ln the past -when our few foreign competitors were -unable to compete with us in quality and price, Bradford was right in supporting free trade, which was keeping down the cost of living and led to cheap production, but the present conditions due to the war have completely reversed the position. We are so handicapped that wo cannot compete with other nations' price* in the Borne market. With the proposed duties, it is reasonable and safe to say that wo could plan mass production and big organisation. Franco is now our chief competitor. She sent, 17.000,000 yards of wool and cloth to Britain during the first nine months of 1925, compared with 7,000.000 in the same period of 1922." "Epidemic" of Protection. • The "Yorkshire Observer" asks:— "How far is the protection epidemio going? Everybody is after duties and subsidies, though it is ourselves we are plundering. We wonder whother those embarking on this perilous adventure imagine that the both home and foreign trade can bo improved by all feeding on one another's tails." The "Manchester Guardian," in an editorial quoting Sir G. Paish's warning in Manchester that Britain js moving towards complete protection, and enumerating the recently appointed committees under the Safeguarding Act, says that it would have thought this sufficiently rapid progress for a Government pledged not to introduce protection by the side door. "It is now reported that pressure is being brought to bear on the Government to speed UP the Safeguarding Act. Sir G. Paish's prediction is not as fantastic as it may seem, to Lancashire voters who believed in Conservatives' assurances that protection was not an issue at the election. Tt cannot help being the issuo because it is tho only remedy for present ills in which "Sic Conservatives believe."