BRITISH BUDGET PROPOSALS

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26094, 22 April 1950, Page 7

BRITISH BUDGET PROPOSALS

CHALLENGE BY OPPOSITION TWO ITEMS LIKELY TO BE DISPUTED (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, April 20. The Opposition has decided to challenge the Government's financial policy by voting against some of the Budget proposals when they come on in the report stage next Wednesday, say political correspondents. The issues likely to be selected are the 9d increase in petrol and the purchase tax on commercial vehicles, and on these issues the Liberals may vote with the Conservatives. ». If the Government is beaten it will resign. The constitutional position which would then arise has been the subject of considerable discussion behind the scenes. If Mr Attlee simply resigned. His Majesty could call on Mr Churchill to form a Government. If he asked formally for a dissolution, most constitutional authorities hold that it would not be refused. Such a request by a Prime Minister has not been refused by the King for more than a century. Speaking in the resumed debate on the Budget to-night, the Conservative war-time Minister of Production (Mr Oliver Lyttelton) argued that some of the Government’s fiscal policies were designed for political ends. If company profits continued to be taxed at the present rates, the day would come when it would no longer be possible to finance private industry out of private saving. He thought the Government was hoping for that *Mr Lyttelton said that Sir Stafford Cripps had devoted too little time in his Budget speech to sterling balances. In 1949 the overall figure of sterling balance and debts Britain owed overseas had hardly changed at all. They stood at £3.344.000,000 at the end of 1949—a reduction of only £15.000,000 on 1948. How long would sterling area countries be allowed to build up sterling balances on that scale? Mr Lyttelton asked. . Much of the increase in unrestricted balances was because of money accumulated by countries like Australia, which was popularly supposed to nave more than £400,000,000 at its disposal in London. “It is certain ‘hat the accumulation ot sterling on this scale must be stopped," he said One dav those who have accumulated it will want to be paid over in cash or goods.”