COMMENT FROM N.Z.

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 116, 18 May 1944, Page 5

COMMENT FROM N.Z.

"LITTLE REAL INFORMATION* Rec 9.40 a.m. LONDON, May 17. J uTll^. New Zealand correspondent of the 'Manchester Guardian" states that little real information has been issued to the people of the Empire overseas about the Prime Ministers' Conference in London, and that they are littie wiser concerning what has been said or done. "To most people," he says, the real issues are economic rather than political. If the Premiers in London are shaping the Empire's future, what are they doing to shape the Empire's trade?" The plain fact is that it was never intended to issue "real information" curing the conference, for, as wa3 pointed out before the conference began, the talks were to be in the nature or informal discussions and would not be very detailed, nor would rigid conclusions be reached. What has ranked as of first importance in the conference was the prosecution of the war against Germar.%and Japan. Economic questions followed, but the discussion on these was only in very general terms, because the British Coalition Government. while united on the conduct of the war, has no definite post-war economic policy affecting the Commonwealth. Each party in the coalition is committed to its own policy, but at tha moment the British Government is unable to speak with a single voice on this subject. As a result, Mr. Churchill and his colleagues are only in a position to exchange views These exchanges have been most helpful, but they were only the first stages in the approach to the question. Mr. Fraser intends to discuss the whole future of New Zealand exports hnv d nPf nv eS7 ith °^l d? ls of the Minis! L y /^ od now that the conference