BRETTON WOODS

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27634, 15 April 1955, Page 9

BRETTON WOODS

,„ Si! j‘~ T h e prospect of the Bretton Woods. Agreement again coming up for PossiMe endorsement is alarming Under its clauses a member country loses al. control of its money and curfuSST astern Such control is absolutely essential to our wellbeing. Our competing members of the international board would be in majority con~o. “d from its decisions there m Ul . d k e no a PP ea I- A U charges paid “ujt be m gold. If we are short of u°-° ne compelled to sell’us gold. We could not go off gold, howveer ruinous, without the consent of the Fund; and we should probably be refused without right of appeal. To go off gold means expulsion. Bretton Woods spells for us the end of exchange or import control. Any reciprocal trade agreement can °^ Iy a superoptimist can find the benefits to be derived from Bretton Woods.—Yours, etc., A 1 FLAMBEAU. April 13, 1955. [Some 50 countries, including nearly every country of any consequence on the free side of the Iron Curtain, are “super-optimistic” enough to value their membership of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank after eight years’ experience of these institutions. None has lost control of its monetary system. Members are obliged only to “consult” the fund about exchange restrictions. If New Zealand had been a member of the fund, its only obligation in gold would have amounted to about £1,100,000.—Ed., “The Press”]