The Hawera Star. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1925. A NEW VIEW OF PREFERENCE.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 12 February 1925, Page 4

The Hawera Star.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1925. A NEW VIEW OF PREFERENCE.

Delivered every evening by 5 o’clock in Hu worn. Alanaia, Normanby, Okainwa, IMhuin, Marigatoki, Kaponga, Alton, Horleyville, Paten,» Waverley, M'okoia, '.Vbakanmra, Ohangai. Aleroniere, Fraser ltoad, and A rarata.

“We have reached the point,” says the Secretary of State for the Colonies, “when the great idea of Empire development. needs transplanting in terms of a great policy.” In other words: It’s about time we stopped talking and got to work. Again to quote Mr Amery: “Settlers will not cross oceans in order to grow produce which they cannot sell. We cannot claim to be in earnest so long as we are not prepared to concentrate the power of the market on Empire development.” The appeal made before the Royal Colonial Institute for a wider type of. Empire preference than that usually understood from the expression may or may not be heeded; but there is no question that the Colonial Secretary placed his finger on the key spring when, he said that the power of the market could be made to control the position. It is not too much to say that. British money has developed the world. From Siberia to Patagonia, from Queensland to Alaska, furs and beef, and sugar, and gold have been summoned to the markets of Europe by the magic wand of British capit.nL, It is this wide diffusion of interest that has made London the financial centre of the world, and though there may be in the widespread field worked by British money some hint of dissipated effort, the whole constitutes a magnificent economic benefit conferred upon mankind. Mr Amery's choice of the United States as a model was hardly a happy one. It is true that, country has concentrated its main effort on internal development—the equivalent of which in our case would be Empire development. But wli.at has been the effect on the American mind? While nationalism is still the dominant force in world politics, there is such a fault as selfcentred egotism. Britain may have spread her money over the face of the earth when she could have served the ends of narrow nationalism better by concentration on development within the Empire; but one result is that Britain has the world outlook: she is every ready to share in bearing the world’s burdens, and she has not been overcome by a sense of her own greatness. At the same time Mr Amery’s plea is logically sound. It is more than a little absurd to ask British housewives to buy Empire meat and butter when, at the same time, British capital is enabling foreign countries to flood the market with their produce. At the present moment the New Zealand Meat Producers’ Board is exploring the Continental market with a view to placing supplies of our meat there; yet in the fortnight which ended last Friday the Argentine and Uruguay'' shipped to the United Kingdom 22,0(17 quarters of frozen beef, 125,150 carcases of mutton, and 82,515 carcases of lamb. Jf that supply were not available, or if the British consumer declined to accept it, there would be no need for New Zealand to be seeking a market on the Continent; Britain would absorb nil the meax she could export. Arid the point lies in the fact that. British nioiicv was behind the establishment of the, South American meat industry. No one is complaining of the position, a position inevitable with the international organisation of modern commerce. Since the average consumer is forced to consider his pocket first, all that can fairly be asked of him is that, other things being equal, he shall give preference in his buying to a British article. And no more is to be expected of the financier; whore an investment within the Empire is a proposition equally attractive, with a foreign investment, lie should give the Empire first choice. Mr Amery could have meant nothing further than that. He is too experienced a statesman to

I advocate an entirely self-centred policy,

for such could never be carried into

effect. But he sees the opportunities for development still offered by the Dominions, and lie knows how keen the Dominions are both for Britishcapital and British immigrants, in order that they he the better able to satisfy the British market with British goods. Boiled down, the Colonial Secretary’s attitude is simply this: alike of the housewife wanting a pound of cheese and the financier with a hundred thousand sovereigns to invest, he asks: “What about helping yourself by keeping your money within the Empire? ’ ’