FINANCE TALKS IN WASHINGTON BRITAIN URGED TO DEFINE REMEDIES FOR DOLLAR CRISIS

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 August 1949, Page 6

FINANCE TALKS IN WASHINGTON BRITAIN URGED TO DEFINE REMEDIES FOR DOLLAR CRISIS

LONDON, August 20.—-The Times today, called on. the British Government to announce its remedies for solving Britain’s economic difficulties, before the British spokesmen left for the Washington economic talks next month. The newspaper said that American sympathy could easily dwindle if the British Ministers and experts arrived with nothing to offer but the hope of more aid.

Unofficial financial quarters ' suggest that British proposals for discusion at the Washington talks will include: 1. The International commodity agreements, which would ensure fair ahd steady prices for the sterling area’s dollaf’-earning. products, notably rubber, tin, and cocoa. 2. Increased American stockpiling of sterling area goods, such as rubber and tin. 3. Extended United States investments in overseas countries, including those of the sterling area. These investments would , raise the living standards of the countries affected and would enable them to bdy mere from the dollar area. 4. A reduction of American tariffs on British goods. The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir Stafford Cripps) has decided to postpone his departure for the Washington talks from August 27 to August 31. This may delay for a day the opening of the conference, scheduled for September 6. Sir Stafford Cripps, who dislikes flying, will remain for an extra period at his Gloucestershire home, where he is convalescing after treatment for a digestive ailment at Zurich. “Serious Bickering” One of the most serious aspects of the present British financial crisis was the internal bickering among the sterling bloc, said Herbert Matthews, London correspondent of the New York Times, in a dispatch to his newspaper today. “Australia and New Zealand are very critical, and show signs of wanting to go off on their own,” said Matthews. “.South Africa wants to sell gold direct to the United States, instead of through the sterling area dollar pool.” ■ - Matthews claimed that British officials took a pessimistic view of the forthcoming talks on sterling in Washington. “There is unanimous agreement that no simple, easy, short-term solutions are possible. Nobody in London expects any dramatic, definitive agreement to emerge from the talks.” Matthews said some experts in London believed that Britain could carry on with very little or no United States help. “It would mean terrific internal and world repercussions, and would be bad for the United States, too, but experts think it is

.feasible. There would be grave hardships in Britain, including unemployment, but- there would be no starvation and no economic collapse. “It would, however, represent the greatest Soviet victory .since the elimination of Nazi Germany, and the strain on British-American relations would be catastrophic, according to a high opinion in London. “One of the highest priorities of Soviet foreign policy is considered in London to have been to cause a split between the United States and the British Commonwealth, and to concentrate its Maximum attack on Britain as the weaker of its two enemies.”