STEEL INDUSTRIES BILL

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22345, 8 March 1938, Page 8

STEEL INDUSTRIES BILL

■to THE EDIXOK OF THE TBESS. c; r The provisions and powers contained in the Steel Industries Bill were ably commented upon m your leading article and by the president of tne Associated Chambers of Commerce this morning, but perbapall may be permitted to mention one or two rf It lta a£SS a *SS Mr Morgan Williams's recent remarks at Kaiapoi that heGovernment is trying to create 'a state of economic self-sufficiency, and establishment of!a State monopoly in the steel industry and the recent increases in tariffs are steps in the direction of drying up the stream of overseas trade. I wonder if the Government and its supporters count the cost of such a plan. That New Zealand is P" 1 ? 3 " ..? farming community and must expo it Hs butter, cheese, meat, and wool in order to maintain its standard of hvins is a fact well known to the Government. For that reason the Minister for Finance. Mr Nash, spent so much Lin England and in Europe trying to extend our markets To that end he negotiated the trade agreement with Germany, and promised the manufacturers of England that every penny spent on our exports would be exchanged for their goods and serVl Mr Morgan Williams must realise that to make New Zealand economically sdf contained automatically means the loss of our markets overseas? fox-in order to sell our goods we must take in return the goods of others If, as he suggests, the possibility of being cut off from our. overseas market is so great as to. justify us in building up uneconom c local industries to the exclusion of imports, we should be told about it and actvteed to tighten our belts accordingly. Economic Self-sufficiency cannot be achieved without great sacrifices on hepart of all the people, as witness the experience of Germany in recent ye r ai et those who govern this country study' th°s aspect of the question beforp nroceeding to dry up the lifeSrlam of our overseas trade in.order to water Into unhealthy growth in the forcTng-bed of Government .monopoly a lot of uneconomic industries. Better bv far to use their energies towards Ms those conditions of. freedom S Sntef orisein which local industries will germinate and flourish. naturally in olen competition with imports.Yours, etc.. SPECTATOR. March 7, 1938.