PROPOSED TYRE FACTORY

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22073, 22 April 1937, Page 14

PROPOSED TYRE FACTORY

DANGER OF MONOPOLY COMPETITION WITH BRITISH GOODS (BBESS AS3OCIATIOM TELEGRAM.) DUNEDIN, April 21. Further criticism of the proposal to establish a motor tyre factory in Christchurch with the assistance of the Government was made last evening by the president of the Chamber of Commerce (Mr Newman Wilson). He stated that the average tyre, weighing 281 b, was already subject to a duty of approximately 5s lOd if imported from Britain, 7s 2d if from Canada, and 22s lOd if from a foreign country. Taking the landed cost of this tyre as £4, the percentage would be roughly 74 per cent, duty on the landed cost from Britain, and 28 per cent, from foreign countries. On a truck tyre weighing 481 b, the duty on British production would be approximately 10s, on a Canadian tyre 12s 3d, and on the foreign-purchased tyre £1 19s 2d. Protection was one thing, but a monopoly was another, said Mr Wilson. The economic factor of competition with British tyres was no small one. At present the Minister for Marketing (the Hon. Walter Nash) was in England endeavouring to arrange trade reciprocity. It must be obvious that New Zealand was not in a position to offend Britain, New Zealand's chief customer for primary products.