EMPIRE EXHIBITION

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 111, 11 May 1923, Page 7

EMPIRE EXHIBITION

DOMINION AND COLONIAL

SECTIONS

POLICY OF CO-OPERATION

MEN, MONEY, AND MARKETS,,

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

LONDON, Bth March,

Major E. A. Belcher, Assistant-Man-ager of the British Empire Exhibition, delivered a lecture yesterday on the Dominion and colonial sections of the exhibition. He spoke at the Royal Society of Arts, and Colonel L. S. Amery, M.P. (First Lord of the Admiralty) was in the chair. Mr. J. M'Whae ('AgentGeneral for Victoria), at the conclusion of the lecture, doubtless voiced the opiniong of the other Dominion representatives present when he said that he felt that the Dominions were obtaining out of these lectures the first dividends from the money they had voted for the exhibition. Referring to a visit he had paid to Wembley, Mr. M'Whae said it did his heart good to see that things were going forward with such vigour. Major Belcher began by emphasising t-he extent to-which the Dominions propose to particiapte. The overseas portions of the Empire will occupy 70,000 sq. ft. of space. If one imagined the whole of the overseas exhibits concentrated into one building, this building would occupy a space sufficiently large to drop Trafalgar Square in five times over, then to drop Olympia in, and there would be a balance left sufficiently large to accommodate the whole of the Army and Navy Stores on one floor. It wanted something stronger than sentiment, Major Belcher maintained, to induce a Dominion to pull a quarter of a million sterling out of its pocket, and to spend it on the construction and equipment of a building 12,000 miles away. He suggested that Imperial sentiment persuaded Dominion Governments to lend a willing ear to the conception of a British Empire Exhibition, but that hardheaded business persuaded them that if it was worth doing at all, it was worth doing well. In the lay-out of the exhi- ! bition they had arranged that certain sections should be ringed in as Dominion territory. Within these sections each Dominion would have complete autoI nomy, and would endeavour to present so vivid a picture of its varied resources I and activities that for the nonce, at all ! events, the visitor might get a real picture of Dominion life, and fancy him- [ self on a voyage of discovery to the Western Continent, and the Southern | Seas, or the Far East. I PAEALLEL PROBLEMS. There were three things that the Dominions required—population, capital, and markets. The United Kingdom, with an area of a little over 100,000 sq. miles, had more than 40,000,000 of inhabitants. New Zealand, approximately about the same size, had only a 'little over 1,000,000 people, while Western Australia, ten time 3as big, had only about one-quarter as many inhabitants as the City of Birmingham. It was no use trying to readjust by artificial means the population of the Empire, unless at the same time capital and markets were also readjusted. If they sent their surplus population to Australia, their surplus capital to the Argentine, and bought their surplus butter from Europe, they could hardly wonder if | some of their schemes hung fire ' economically. | " Once you admit as a truth," said ' Major Belcher, " that problems of migration, production, and markets are parallel problems, you can approach every economic theory from a different angle. If by imposing or removing a I duty on sultanas you can find a home for ] thousands of young Englishmen along j the valley of the Murray River, you are no longer a red-hot tariff-reformer or a ■rigid' Manchester Free-trader, but you I are a level-headed business man who as 1 weighing 'the advantages and disadvantages of a certain policy in the light of the ultimate advantages or disadvan- | tages which may accrue to the Empire. | This is an. aspect of the British Empire Exhibition of which the public must | not loaf «icht. It is a great publicity campaign in which there are three partners—the Dominions and colonies, the

promoters of th 6 Exhibition, and the British public. The Dominions and colonies have attractions to offer. It is their business to present those attractions in the most convincing form. It is the duty of the public to give all a fair run for their money. They*must give' a fair run to the Dominions and colonies, because the amount of Empire produce which can ;be consumed within j the' Exhibition is negligible compared ! with what might be consumed outside. The man who visits the Exhibition and eats a New Zealand lamb chop, half an ounce of Australian butter ,a bunch of South African grapes, a Canadian apple, and washes it down with a bottle of Quelltaler or a cup of East 'African coffee or Ceylon tea, then takes a present home to his wife of an Indian carpet, j is not playing the game if he' thinks he ! has fulfilled his duty to the Empire. In common decency he must give these things a run for their money outside. Personally, I am convinced that if he does so he will continue to purchase these commodities, because of their quality and price. No intelligent person imagines that this means the cessation of all trade relations with the rest of the world. If every Dominion sends every | ounce of its exportable butter to this country, there will still be a big market for all the English farmer can produce, and another big market for butter imported from foreign sources. All that the ' Dominions ask . is that they shall get in on- the ground floor, and that so long as their supplies last —and, from the co*sumer's point of view, they.;.can produce an article that is worth its price—the British consumer shall support the family shop." • THREE WORLD'S RECORDS.. Referring to the Stadium, Major Belcher said that it has broken three world's records. It was the largest building in the world; it was the cheapest building in the world; and it had been constructed in the quickest time. The two large buildings, with a floor space of 10 acres each, for ,the display of Home products, were scheduled to be completed by 11th August, _ about eight months before the Exhibition opened. "If the public support us," he continued, "we shall achieve our ultimate purpose, which is that the Exhibition may be so successful financially that we can hand over Wembley Park and such of the buildings as have been constructed with guarantors' money, as a gift to the nation, an abiding memorial ot what the British Empire means and stands for, what it has achieved in five years of peace, and what it may achieve if we adopt and adapt the same spirit of co-operation and loyalty to each other as made the British Empire one of the principal factors in the maintenance of civilisation." ( THE IRISH FREE STATE. Major Belcb.er then had thrown on the screen pictures of the buildings which would be erected by the various Dominions, and he mentioned the intsrat»

ing fact that the youngest Dominion, the Irish Free State, had just arranged to erect a building .on ithe left of the north entrance, opposite the South African pavilion.

At the conclusion of the lecture. Colonel Amery said the Exhibition would be a record of what the Empire wae doing, and could do, in the way of Imperial development. He believed it wa» only by co-operation, that a, way could be found out-of the difficulties which the war had left behind it. Co-operation implied three things—men, money, and markets. The United Kingdom could supply the first, and London was still the cheapest and best place to get the second, while so far as the third was concerned, the United Kingdom was the best consuming market in the world. There was, therefore, a clear line of policy marked out. It was not a policy of exclusion. They did not want to cease trading with other countries, but they wantetd to develop trade within the Empire—what he would call a policy of Imperial preference.