SERIOUS ABUSE: NO-REMITTANCE LICENSE PLAN

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23352, 7 September 1950, Page 6

SERIOUS ABUSE: NO-REMITTANCE LICENSE PLAN

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, Sept. 7. The Prime Minister, Mr. S. G. Holland, told the United Kingdom Manufacturers and New Zealand Representatives’ Association yesterday that there had been serious abuse of the system of no-remit-tance licenses. Some people hat! been getting their principals overseas to charge additional prices or commissions so that exchange could be built up.

He did not believe that members of the association would be guilty of these practices.

The Government had to reflect on its recent decision to allow no-remittance licenses for imports. It could not allow these practices to develop. The Government had permitted people to import goods when they Had their own overseas funds, but he would point out that buying or selling of overseas exchange was illegal. “We have done a lot of things to make conditions of trade easier, but our experience has not been altogether satisfying,” said Mr. Holland. “Having decided to grant no-remittance licenses we find that some people are wanting to get their principals to charge an extra 2£ per cent so that they can get a no-remittance license with the extra money. Others have been asking their principals to charge extra commission and so build up the funds. “That I regret to say is what is being done and there is an awful lot of it. It is an offence to buy overseas funds just as it is to sell them.”

When Government measures were abused by one or two of the people the Government was trying to help the effect would be to reduce the amount of overseas funds available for licenses. If the Government were to allow these practices to develop it would find importers generally saying to those overseas: “Charge us a bit more” and the importers would be having all the say in the expenditure of the country s overseas funds. He did not consider the association’s proposal for the replacement of import licensing by exchange control practical.

Complaints Made

The morning after the Government’s announcement of the removal of control from 326 items in the tariff schedule he looked at the neswpapers to see the reaction of traders to this gesture, thinking that it would be enthusiastically receiver, but all he saw was a complaint that the Government had made a mess of the thing because there were no pianos in it. Some importers had complained that the Government had taken a retrograde step in reverting to December 31 for the close of the import-licensing year, the Government however had put the 1951 schedule out earlier than ever—on August I—and1 —and had given importers 17 months to organise and get the goods into the country. “Having given you 17 months to the end of December next year, we mean that date has to stand,” he said. “There must not be any pushing about of dates.”