TROUBLE—AND THE FAMILY SPIRIT

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 70, 24 March 1933, Page 6

TROUBLE— AND THE FAMILY SPIRIT

So many things are in the crucible nowadays, and so - many ' formerly fixed measurements have become unfixed, that it is a matter of exceeding difficulty maintain any sort of order' in international trade, or even in domestic trade. Assets that .formerly had a definite security value have lost that value, or are at a reduced value—in some cases as a result of direct and intentional Government action —and the many currencies that make up money itself jump about,-so.that innocent people [may lose heavily one day by fluctuations in value-measurement over] which they have no control. Worse still—remedial action by one Government reacts on other Governments. | Depreciation of New Zealand money [is followed by depreciation of Danish, and though the Canadians say they will not depreciate, they have a plan to iron out fluctuations in exchange.so that their exporters will have some stability in values; and that in turn reacts on the distribution of Empire trade. One reassuring element in this tangle is that the British Empire supplies a framework strong enough, and yet sufficiently elastic, to give economic cross-currents ( play without producing devastating storms.' With, four or five far-flung depressed countries' competing in one central market and courting its favours, there would have been acute trouble long ago were they not united in an Empire of give-and-take. Yet "Canada, Australia, Africa, and New Zealand, satisfied with the general good of the Empire bond, pursue their competing courses in peace, and negotiate the most complex economic problems. Conversely, a simple and (arbitrable [economic difficulty becomes a pretext for Empire-disruption when the complaining Government is actuated not so much by economic motives as \hy political ambition and historic hates. ' *