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Press, Volume C, Issue 29680, 25 November 1961, Page 16

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Concern Over Capital

( N Z.P. A.-Re«ter— Copyright) SYDNEY. Nov. 23. Australia would suffer a "great drying-up’’ of British capital but would fare better than other Commonwealth countries, if Britain joined the European Common Market, the President of the Senate. Sir Alister McMullin, said yesterday. Addressing the Australian Chartered Accounts Research Society. Sir Alister McMullin declared that if Britain joined, British Ministers of State would be subject to policy decisions by politicians and bureaucrats in Europe. He said that agitators in some countries would not hesitate to capitalise on Britain's entry, and the Soviet would always have capital available for any Commonwealth country which cared to turn to her. Sir Alister McMullin said that Canada feared Britain’s entry could increase her economic dependence on the United States to the point where political independence would become a sham, and the West Indies felt that the abandonment of traditional trade preferences could lead to collapse and economic disaster. New Zealand would be more profoundly affected than Australia, he said. Australia would have an advantage over other Commonwealth countries because of the wider range of exports it had developed.