Picture of U.K. all wrong

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33869, 14 June 1975, Page 22

Picture of U.K. all wrong

i ( .a z., rruss .hsdcHiuun» TE AROHA. 1 The news media in this ('country paints a picture Of a crushed and fallen Britain, and this is wrong, according! to the agricultural attache to the British High Commission in New Zealand, Mr A. H. Baines. “Television viewers and newspaper readers in New Zealand may very well doubt that there is a bottom to) anything at all in Britain.” said Mr Baines. “But, in reality, things are very much different.” Mr Baines said that much went unrecorded — town rebuilding, industrial growth, improvements in food and health, -and in his own particular sphere, agriculture — “of which 1 am very: proud." He conceded that there: were problems in Britain, but only the problems facing, countries throughout the I world—balance of payments. I inflation, and unemployment.) “We are certainly no worse I off than a lot of other coun-|:

.tries, and very much bette off than some, while th, economic base of Britain i fundamentally assured.” sail Mr Baines. He described Britain as at

island built on coal and surrounded by a sea of oil Some 5m tons of oil would be brought ashore this veai, and Britain would be exporting oil by 1980. "History proves the ability of the British people to face crisis and problems, whethe: they be economic, industrial or of conflict. “And I want to redress the picture too often painted by the New Zealand news media, epitonusing Britain as crushed and fallen awav."