BRITAIN'S TRADE

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 15 June 1926, Page 5

BRITAIN'S TRADE

WITHIN THE EMPIRE. ’ STEADILY INCREASING. / NATION’S ECONOMIC FUTURE, BY CABLE—PRESS ASSOCIATION -GOP ZRIGHT. Received 11.15 a.m. to-day. MELBOURNE, June 14. Referring to the sharp decline in British trade this 1 ' year, the total diminution of which to* the end of May, compared with the same period of last year, reached £118,000,000, the Federal Prime Minister (Mr S. M.'Bruce) says: ‘ ‘ The position is calculated to cause concern to British communities in other parts of the world, especially since they realise the extent to which their own economic future is bound up with that of Britain. I can only hope for a corresponding realisation in Great Britain of the extent to which her future trading prosperity is bound up with her overseas Dominions. lam inclined to think the question of' development of Empire trade is too commonly regarded in Britain as a matter which affects the overseas Empire primarily and Britain herself only secondarily, but I cannot emphasise too strongly the point that this is a matter in which the interests are reciprocated. No one can tell ■whether the decline in Britain’s foreign trade is temporary or partly permanent, but of one thing there is no doubt, that Empire trade forms a steadily increasing proportion of the total of the oversea trade of the United Kingdom.”