TARIFF ANOMALIES

Evening Star, Issue 17062, 5 June 1919, Page 3

TARIFF ANOMALIES

In the course of his evidence beiore the Industrial Committee at Wellington vesterday, Mr W. B. Montgomery, Comptroller of Customs, described the measures taken in Australia to regulate the tariff. A Tariff Board had been established, havine general functions relating to trade and ■industry. The board had no power to amend the- tariff. They merely made recom- j - mendations. He understood that the recom- , msndations had not had. very much "jn«- I ence with Parliament in Australia. The , process of tariff amendment m Australia j was the same as in New Zealand. Under j the Australian tariff New Zealand was | treated as a foreign country. New Zsa- j land <*ave Australia preferential treatment. The reciprocal tariff treaty arranged with Australia by Mr F. M. B. Fisher lapsed | before comoletion owing to a change oi j Government in the Commonwealth. There had been cases of deiibrate dumping oi overseas goods in New Zealand with the object of killing a local industry. Replying to a auestion, Mr Montgomery said the Government had no special power at present to prevent dumping from overseas countries, but he had submitted a clause somewhat similar to the law in operation in Canada. The clause had the approval of the Minister of Customs. It was not proposed to interfere with dumping in cases where no local industry was threatened. He believed New Zealand should have an evolutionary tariff instead of a fixed one. The existing tariff was not sufficiently elastic, and there was no doubt it had tampered the establishment- of industries in the Dominion. He had prepared an amendment to the Customs law which he understood the Minister was prepared to place before Parliament at the first onortnniiy. The amendment was designed to rectify anomalies and remove conditions that iiave been injurious to New Zealand manufacturers. The clause provided that in the case of articles admitted free, the Minister should have the power to impose a preferential duty in favor of British dominions.