IMPORT POLICY AND ITS EFFECTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 123, 26 May 1945, Page 6

IMPORT POLICY AND ITS EFFECTS

The statement made by Mr. Nash in an election, address at Hamilton in defence of the Government's policy of import control left so many things unsaid that it cannot be regarded as a satisfactory reply to recent criticism. Certainly it contained very little that is likely to allay the concern, amounting in some cases to resentment, which has been expressed in the United Kingdom regarding the lock-out effect of the policy to which the Leader of the Opposition (Mr, Holland) referred earlier this week. Mr. Nash declared that the need for conserving sterling funds made it imper-tive that exchange control (involving import selection; should be continued, and went on to say that the policy was introduced to ensure that the sterling necessary to meet our commitments was available on the date. The abandonment of import control would jeopardise any assurance that our debts could be met when they became due. The need for conserving sufficient sterling funds to service our overseas debt commitments is, of course, obvious, but does Mr. Nash suggest that, in order to do this, it is necessary to apply blanket restrictions on the importation of a wide variety of goods and to apply them indefinitely? Surely to suggest this is to suggest that the conditions which forced the Government to apply exchange control and importl selection at the end of 1938—conditions of the Government's own making—are also to remain a permanent feature of the country's economy while the present Government is in office. In his Hamilton speech Mr. Nash failed to distinguish between the need for setting aside out of the country's sterling assets a sufficient sum +o meet our debt commitments as they fall due and the conservation of our funds by blanket restrictions which have the effect of locking out goods which British manufacturers are prepared to supply on a competitive basis. As Mr. Holland has pointed out, British manufacturers are willing to contend with tariff duties, with high exchange, and with freight and insurance charges, but they do object to being asked to contend with the additional protection which import "control confers on New Zealand manufacturers. All they seek is a reasonable opportunity to,show that they can supply, on a reasonable competitive basis, many of the goods which we need. Under the present system-that opportunity is being denied them. One of the main points of criticism raised both in the United Kingdom and New Zealand has been that the procedure at present being followed in New Zealand is sharply at variance with the undertaking given by the Minister of Finance in 1939 that import control would not be used to bolster up uneconomic industries in this country to the detriment of British industry. At Hamilton Mr. Nash avoided any reference to this undertaking. In. the interests of good understanding with the manufacturers of Britain, however, it cannot be avoided. Mr. Holland's observations in the United Kingdom make it clear that Mr. Nash's assurance has been taken seriously by British manufacturers —as any such assurance should be —and that they are looking to the Government to carry it out. It cannot be said that the contemplated policy complies with the undertaking and it is for Mr. Nash to say why. The Minister of Finance.stated that the import control policy was being employed to safeguard the Dominion's economic stability by protecting the position of our sterling funds. It is necessary to examine this statement in the light of clear indications given by leading members of the Government that while the Labour Party remains in office import control will be a permanent feature of its policy. If exchange control and import selection have been necessary to safeguard the country against the effects of a lack of balance between internal and external funds, and if the controls are to be a permanent feature of our economy, then is it to be assumed that this lack of balance is also to be pei"manent? •■lf such an assumption is not justified, then how does Mr. Nash reconcile his reference to the safeguarding nature of the controls with unequivocal statements by other members of the Government that the controls are to be permanent? Again, it is for Mr. Nash to say. Apart from such considerations as these, however, there are the strongest grounds for reviewing the operation of the present cumbersome and dictatorial control system. It places in the hands of the Minister of Customs and his advisers powers which, without reference to Parliament, can be used in such a way as to constitute a direct and highly undesirable interference with normal trading practices. It is left to a few officials, whose knowledge of the requirements of the people cannot be compared with that of those who have been successfully catering for the needs of the people for a long period, to decide what type of goods shall be brought into the country from overseas and what type of goods shall be excluded. Moreover, New Zealand manufacturers and those importers who are in possession of licences are given a vested interest in the perpetuation of the regulations. Mr. Nash refuted any suggestion that monopolies have been created, but when there is a virtual lock-out on certain imported goods and when the issue of licences is largely restricted to those who have obtained them in the past it is difficult to escape the conclusion that monopolies have, in fact, been created. The regulations also impose unreasonable restrictions on consumers by strictly limiting their right to decide the goods they may purchase with their own money. If a person prefers, to purchase an article manufactured in Great Britain, and is prepared to pay the additional landing costs involved—duty, exchange, and freight and insurance charges—then surely it is beyond reason to give a group of Government officials the right to say that he must not do so and must be content *.vith a locallymanufactured article. If this modern type of sumptuary law is imposed by the order of Government officials in) normal times, the citizen has every j right to complain of an unwarrantable | interference with his rights as an individual, rights . which were once firmly established but which appear to be rapidly disappearing under a bureaucratic form of Government. It will be for the people to say, at the appropriate time, whether those rights are to be restored or not.