EMPIRE'S INFLUENCE

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 112, 5 February 1926, Page 9

EMPIRE'S INFLUENCE

WORLD’S GREATEST AGENCY FOR GOOD WHOLEHEARTED ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION ESSENTIAL TO FULLEST DEVELOPMENT The Secretary for the Dominions says the Empire to-day is the greatest agency for good the world has known, and that upon its unity, security, and development depends mankind’s peaceful progress. Br TEi.EGiiArn.—PnEss Association Copyright. London, February 3. Representatives from throughout the Empire of trade, commerce, fin ??. ce > and administration, including the High Commissioners and Agents-General, celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Empire Producers’ Organisation with a luncheon at the Mansion House, and presented the Secretary of State for the Dominions, Mr. L. C. M. Amery, with his portrait in oils. Lord Kylsant, who presided, emphasised that the subscribers throughout the Empire desired to honour Mr. Amery’s lifelong devotion to the ideal of Empire development. Mr. Amery declared that the Empire to-day was the greatest agency for good the world had yet known. Upon the Empire’s unity, security, and development depended not only the happiness and welfare of their own peoples, but mankind’s peaceful progress. The fullest mutual development, however, was only obtainable by wholehearted economic co-operation throughout the Empire, . directed at raising the standard of living. Otherwise the Empire was doomed to disaster, lhe good-will existing everywhere _ must be translated into effective action, destroying the remnants of the lingering superstition that prosperity depended on the maintenance of a starvation basis for workers. The progress towards a nobler conception of Imperial co-operation, Mr. Amery proceeded, had been considerable and included preference on sugar, wine, tobacco, and silk, the McKenna duties, and the Safeguarding of Industries Act. Greater results would follow’ better publicity and marketing research, wherein the Empire Producers’ Organisation had rendered immense services and assisted Imperial consolidation. Britain’s future depended also on the education of the business world and the British public within the next three years in the full meaning of an Imperial economic policy, with a view to its whole-hearted adoption. Then the Empire’s problems would be speedily solved. Mr. Ben Morgan, chairman of the British Empire' Producers’ Organisation, said that at present it was essential to carry preferences over a period of years instead of introducing them annually, and thereby discouraging continuity of effort. The War Office was a great offender against preference by securing a large proportion of its supplies from foreign sources. On the contrary, the Admiralty consistently gave preference to the Dominions. —Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.