COMMONWEALTH ECONOMY

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26025, 31 January 1950, Page 4

COMMONWEALTH ECONOMY

PART TO BE PLAYED BY DOMINIONS

VIEWS OF PROFESSOR COPLAND

From Our Own Reporter

TIMARU, Jan. 30. A warning to New Zealanders that the. comfort and security they enjoyed might not be enduring, and that New Zealand, together with other members of the British Commonwealth, must i stand beside Britain to achieve economic unity in the Western World, was given by Professor D. B. Copland, in a luncheon address to members of the Timaru Rotary Club yesterday. Professor Copland said that New Zealand was fortunate to be able to rely on a ready market for her produce, which meant that to most New Zealanders life was relatively simple and that they could look forward to security in the future. In his travels through the country he had been impressed with the extreme comfort which the people enjoyed, and had noted the confidence of young persons in the permanence of this arrangement, Professor Copland said. •“I would say that New Zealand is basking in the sunshine of an Indian summer. We have taken the British market for granted, and have sheltered behind it. I have wondered whether New Zealanders have really seriously considered the world they live in,” said Professor Copland. “This security may be a dangerous thing. As Shakespeare has it in Macbeth: ‘Security is mortals’ chiefest enemy.’ If you reflect on the course of historv you will find that tnis is a profound truth. Security is for those who deserve it. It is security if the economic position of the United Kingdom can be met by the present policy of the United Kingdom and her friends in the Commonwealth and the sterling area. Dollar Borrowing It was true that New Zealand had supplied fcod and materials and had limited her dollar expenditure, but this was not the positive role that should be played by New Zealand and the other Dominions if sterling was once more to become an international currency, Professor Copland said. According to newspaper reports it might be necessary for Britain tp go to the United States again for assistance. The United States had been generous, and Britain had in spite of other difficulties been taking an undue proportion of the risks of dollar borrowing. It was up to the younger members of the British Commonwealth to take some of the risks. “All the Dominions are young and have political systems which it is important to preserve. They have an unsullied record of meeting their obligations and each has great possibilities of development and of increasing its population. They occupy a fringe around Europe and Asia across which the United States can move towards promoting economic unity in the Western world. . • "We are not forsaking Britain by going to the United States for assistance,” Professor Copland continued. “In effect, we are sustaining her efforts to restore sterling in the United States. This in the end is the only way in which the economic unity of Western Europe can be restored. Leadership of U.B. “The gifts and loans of some twentyfive billion dollars made to the world by the United States were on a scale so magnificent that the charge could not be sustained that this generosity was wholly on account,,of national self interest. The United States was anxious to get back to normal investment and trading conditions, but found herself in a cleft stick because of the self-sufficiency of her own economy, her responsibility towards a debilitated Western Europe, and, latterly, the turn of events in Southeast Asia.

“If the Western world is to be preserved then the United States must be its unchallenged leader. We must accept that fact, and for my part 1 can see nothing wrong with it,” declared the speaker. “The comfort, ease, and protection New Zealand enjoys to-day might well rest on a precarious foundation. I have been astonished to a degree to see the amount of control exercised over the economic life of New Zealand. The more you come into contact with the outside world the more self-reliant you are forced to become. Self-reli-ance will be the best national asset should the foundations of economic security be imperilled by the new external forces that have arisen because of the war,” Professor Copland concluded.