COLONIAL POLICY

Grey River Argus, 20 March 1940, Page 7

COLONIAL POLICY

ANGLO-FRENCH CO-OPERATION.

(Received March 19, 5.5 p.m.) RUGBY, March 18. Conversations have been proceeding in Paris between Rt. Hon. M. MacDonald (British Secretary for the Colonies) and M. Mandel (French Colonial Minister). They have agreed on measures to be taken to perfect the collaboration between the British and French Colonial Empires, within the framework of the general agreement of November last. In many parts of the world, their colonial territories are neighbours, and the Ministers feel that each Government has much to gain from the experience of the other. They have therefore, decided that the Colonial Office and the Ministry for the Colonies should henceforth keep in constant touch, and that an organisation should be created, both in London and Paris, to maintain a permanent liaison between the two departments. This collaboration, which must have as its principal object the greater well-being of the colonial peoples, will be extended to the colonies themselves. There will be conferences from time to time between the Governors of neighbouring British and French colonial territories. This contact will also be established between the administrative and specialist officers of the territories. Meanwhile, officers of the Colonial Office, who accompanied Mr MacDonald, have taken advantage of their visit to Paris, to settle with their French colleagues a number of common problems regarding production and trade communications.

"The Times” says editorially: “Cooperation between Great Britain and France involves, as a matter of course, co-operation between the British and French Empires. The object is to work out, and apply, a method •of co-operation which will be of permanent value in the development of the two Colonial Empires, which will promote the welfare of all their inhabitants.