The Grey River Argus SATURDAY, December 18, 1948. NEW RECORD IN DOMINION’S TRADE

Grey River Argus, 18 December 1948, Page 4

The Grey River Argus SATURDAY, December 18, 1948. NEW RECORD IN DOMINION’S TRADE

pOSSIBLY the prosperity of the Dominion is regarded by the National Party as the biggest fly in their political ointment, and explains why the Leader has attempted to discredit the good inicomes of the primary producers by talking about inflation. The last figures show not only that our surplus of exports over imports for the present year is twice as great as it was for the previous year, but also that the favourable balance has been maintained since the value of our currency was raised to the same level as that of Britain’s currency. There has been, of course, a marked increase both of imports and of exports over those of 1947, but Mr Nash draws the inference that the raising of the value of our money is not going to have any undue effect on the total income derived within the Dominion from the exports. The crockery trade has been questioned by certain undisclosed vested interests, who have alleged that the Dominion should be importing more than she does from Britain. The allegations of a great barrage against the British manufacturers of chinaware and pottery prove to be quite unfounded, the spokesman of New Zealand manufacturers of these commodities pointing out that the coming year will see importations enormously greater than suggested by the people who have tried to push the barrow of the oversea crockery industry. It is obvious that the complaint, for which our press has been made the medium of utterance by a cable from London, has, as remarked by the representative of our own manufacturers, been put into the mouths of their oversea competitors by traders here who prefer to sell imported crockery. Britain may certainly be experiencing economic stringency, but it is a fact that she pays the Dominions definitely less for foodstuffs than she pays foreigners. At present she expects to put the screw on Argentina to the extent of diverting the latter’s meat back from the Continent, where it fetches more, but New Zealand politicians who say we should sacrifice local industry for overseas industry would find in Britain no politicians to agree in principle with them. There the idea is to import the cheapest goods for consumption and to secure the widest oversea market so as to expand manufacturing and the employment it affords.

While the exchange parity policy is definitely the opposite of inflation, the fact that our primary producers secure good prices cannot, even by National Party arg'uments, be reckoned inflation either. Auckland woollen millers have naturally reacted pretty pointedly to the fantastic remarks of the Opposition Leader regarding Dominion wool prices, which, he said, were high because the Government made up from taxes for New Zealand buyers the difference between the actual price and the upset prices. The fact is naturally cited that wool is here sold at world prices, and those are set by oversea buyers, and not by local buyers. The higher prices at Christchurch cited by Mr Holland were set by outsiders before New Zealand millers bought any wool at all, one oversea buyer alone securing more than twice as much as all of the New Zealand jnillers, and a second oversea buyer taking also more than the total bought by

Dominion mills. The alternative to accepting the run of the market would have been for New Zealanders to run short of woollens. Taken generally, the Dominion’s econoniic situation strongly demonstrates the Government’s foresight.