Exports

Press, 24 September 1988, Page 24

Exports

Sir,—l am absolutely amazed to read your front page headline and article today. Exports are suddenly rediscovered by the Government as a source of income and in the truisms of the Planning Council’s latest pronouncement. Before this Government was elected, the export sector was thriving and the income derived from it increasing every year. The Opposition, particularly Philip Burdon, has been hammering the importance of exports at every opportunity, but his comments have fallen on deaf ears. The Government has succeeded in bringing the export sector to the point of no growth at best and, at worst, bankruptcy. It is a bit late for Mr Lange to suddenly endorse productivity and overseas sales when the productive export sector of the economy has been nearly destroyed by the policies of this Government. It is an incredible insult for Mr Rankin, of the Planning Council, to tell the export sector “to pull up its socks” when farmers and manufacturers have been battered for four years by destructive Government policies, in spite of ail the logical arguments and the evidence against such policies. — Yours, etc., GORDON BROWN. September 21, 1988.