TRADE ALIGNMENT

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 123, 20 November 1941, Page 8

TRADE ALIGNMENT

AUSTRALIA AND U.S.A.

AMERICAN PLAN REJECTED

(Rec. 10 a.m.) CANBERRA, Nov. 19. The Commonwealth Government has informed the United States that it cannot accept proposals which would limit the future development of Australian industries.

The United States proposals, in trade discussions with Australia, were, firstly, that there should be no extension of existing Australian industries producing goods of a kind which America is supplying to Australia, secondly, that there should be no establishment of new industries to produce this kind of goods.

The American viewpoint was that it would be unreasonable to expect America to build new plants and expand existing industries to supply Australia's urgent war needs and be shut out of the Australian market as soon as the war is over.

In declining to agree to the proposals, the Australian Government intimated that Parliament should not be fettered for years ahead on matters of fiscal policy. The Government further contended that the conclusion of farreaching trade agreements might prolong the war, because they would be equivalent to telling the people of occupied Europe that no matter how the war ended they would be shut out of the British-American economic sphere after the war.