OTTAWA DELEGATES

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 September 1932, Page 6

OTTAWA DELEGATES

SPEECHES AT LUNCHEON. [PEG PBESS ASSOCIATION.] WELLINGTON, September 19. Speaking at the Chamber of Commerce luncheon to-day, Mr Gullett (Australian Customs Minister) spoke of cordial relations having existed between the Australian and New Zealand delegates, and thanked Messrs Coates and Stewart for their help. He said: “I think we have obtained as much from Ottawa as we expected to obtain. Some sections of the community may be disappointed, but I think that, from an Australian and Empire standpoint, it has been one of the most signally successful the world has ever seen.” They could not expect prices to be miraculously raised to the clouds over night, he said, but undoubtedly the industrial benefits would be considerable when the former price levels returned. Australia and New Zealand would be amongst the first to recover.

Mr Coates paid a tribute to the advisers with the New Zealand delegation. All the talk of the meat wars, and of the “Armistice Sunday,” etc., was the sheerest nonsense. There was a cordial feeling throughout the deliberations, including the feeling of the Irish representatives. The dominating factor was the Empire as a whole, and not any sectional interests. There would not, he said, be a complete return to prosperity until normal trade was resumed throughoutout the world. All of the delegates had placed first the economic welfare of the whole Empire. It was a tribute to the delegates that they had definitely established an economic policy for the Empire. Mr Coates added: “I would not say that we are through the wood yet. The future calls for the best in everybody if we are, ultimately, to come through; and we will come through with satisfaction and credit. It is in us and I think we will do it.” Mr R. W. Dalton, British Trade Commissioner, of Sydney, said that he regarded the Ottawa ’ Conference as a beginning. If prosperity came, it would come with a flood because they all understood each other as they had never understood each other before. Mr Dalton . paid a tribute to Mr Coates’ leadership of the New Zealand delegation, and said that nobody at Ottawa did his job better than did Mr Coates.

Mr R. W. Knox, former President of the Melbourne Chamber of Commerce, on behalf of the Australian Chambers of Commerce, extended fraternal greetings to the New Zealand Chambers. He said they would 3 do everything in their power to make a ■success of the Empire Conference of Chambers of Commerce at Wellington next year.

N.Z. MEAT EXPORTS WELLINGTON, September 19. 1 Particulars of New Zealand’s agree- 1 ment with the United Kingdom to pro- ! vide an estimate of New Zealand’s meat exports at the beginning of each season were released for publication ■ by Mr. Coates to-day. The Dominion 1 has undertaken to keep to annual export estimates. This part of hei’ meat ;> agreement differs from that of Austra-

lia, which has agreed to limit her exports during the calendar year 1933 to the same volume as her exports during the year ended June 30, 1932. It is also stated officially that the general form of New Zealand’s meat agreement differs from Australia’s. Details of the Dominion’s meat agreement were contained in a letter written by Mr. Coates to Mr. Baldwin the day before the Ottawa Conference closed. Its purport has already been published in New Zealand, but the document now released does not contain certain paragraphs dealing with the prescription of a minimum reduction to be effected in the United Kingdom imports of certain foreign meats, concerning which Britain has yet to negotiate with other countries, to assist in the orderly marketing of supplies. . . The letter says: “The Dominion will give a reliable estimate of her shipments of mutton and lamb as early as possible in each ’export season. This season will necessarily cover the period from October 1 in one yeai to September 30 in the following year. For the season 1932-1933 we estimate our exports of frozen mutton and lambs at 200,000 tons, with five per cent, increase in each of the following two years. For the calendar year 1933, you may take it that our shipments of frozen mutton and lamb will be the same as those of the twelve months ended June 30, 1932; that, is of. the year ended with the month immediately preceding opening of the conference. It is understood in consideration. of this undertaking that no i estnction will be placed by Britain upon the importation of any meat from New Zealand during the period ending June 30, 1934.”

MINISTERIAL FREE TRADERS

LONDON, September 19. Though a campaign to induce further Liberal Ministers to resign from the Ministry has recently been intensified, the “Morning Post” says these efforts have failed. Sir FI. Samuel and his colleagues, it says, disagree with some of the Ottawa Conference decisions, but they believe that the need of maintaining solidarity in the National Government outweighs party considerations.