BRITISH PROSPERITY

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 121, 16 February 1937, Page 9

BRITISH PROSPERITY

Arms Expenditure Not

Only Reason

GENUINE RECOVERY

Stimulus For Revival From

Other Causes

(British Official Wireless.)

Rugby, February 13. Speaking in London last night, Sir Thomas Inskit). Minister for Co-ordin-ation of Defence, said that the present prosperity in Britain was not due to rearmament work, but was a natural, sound, and genuine wave of prosperity, and that the weight of the rearmament programme had hardly begun to be felt by industry. Referring to house building, which continues to be particularly active, he said there was no bulwark more sure than that long line of men and women who owned their own homes and their own land. Britain’s Maginot Line was the homes that people owned and would defend if necessary. The Transport Minister, Mr, L. More Belisha, speaking in Edinburgh last night, said that while at present defence was the paramount consideration in Government expenditure its effects in stimulating revival must not be exaggerated. The stimulus for that revival came from other causes. Defence expenditure, though placing a strain on certain trades, was small in relation to Britain’s normal factory output of about £2,000,000,000 annually. Every effort had been made to arrange for fulfilment of the defence requirements without dislocating the normal development of industry. At the same time all that necessity required would be done, and with accelerated speed, to modernise and perfect the defences' by sea, land and air. The request that would .be made for Parliament to borrow up to £400,000,000 might well b e a chastening reminder, wherever it might be appropriate, that Britain was ready to employ in the area of her responsibilities her man power, her materials, and—what, had ever been the most powerful and irresistible of her weapons—her financial’ resources.

It is now anticipated that the debate on defence which will be raised in the House of Commons in the committee stage of the necessary financial resolution seeking authority to raise up to £400,000.000 by loan for rearmament purposes will extend over two days next week. According to present plans the debate will open on Thursday instead of Wednesday as was originally intended. The request by the Labour Party for a White Paper giving full details of the work in hand and in contemplation lias been acceded to, and the document is already under preparation. It will probably be published on Tuesday.

GERMANY IMPRESSED

British Determination to Rearm Ixnldon, February 14. The Berlin correspondent of the “Observer’’ says that the British plans for a loan of £400,000,000 have deeply impressed the Government, which is now convinced of the British determination to rearm.

Meanwhile, as the Germans have not been told the exact cost of German armaments, it is easy for newspapers to affect astonishment at the British outlay with a view to impressing the German masses with the necessity for sacrifices in the cause of defence.