Manawatu Evening Standard. MONDAY, MAY 12, 1930. “THE DOMINANT FACTOR."

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 139, 12 May 1930, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. MONDAY, MAY 12, 1930. “THE DOMINANT FACTOR."

Empire free trade is said to have been the dominant factor at the West Euiham by-election, reference to which was made in these columns editorially on Eriday. Closely associated with that is the question of Imperial preference, which the iconoclastic free trade Chancellor of the British Exchequer has intimated his intention of abolishing, together with the policy of safeguarding and the McKenna duties. In the course of a recent debate in the House of Commons, Mr Snowden justified the policy he is adopting by pointing to the fact that Germany which has a protective policy has three million unemployed workers, against half that number in Britain. He ignores the fact that thousands of men have been thrown out of employment in Britain because foreign countries, where wages are lower and the working hours are longer, are permitted to dump whatever goods they like into Britain duty tree. It is rather singular, to say the least, that a Labour Government, which relies so largely upon labour unions for the support it receives, should act on principles so directly contrary to those which govern the unions. The latter are essentially protective in the measures they adopt to safeguard the interests of their members.

By allowing dumped goods produced by cheap foreign labour to come into the country duty free, the Labour Government is throwing thousands of men out of work, and, indirectly perhaps but none the less surely, is helping to reduce the wages of those who are left. Labour delegates are reported to have been ‘‘staggered” at the annual meeting of the National Committee of the Amalgamated Engineering Union by their president stating that they could not get a further reduction of hours, apart from safeguarding —the safeguarding that is that Mr Snowden has announced his intention of abolishing in spite of the manifest benefits it has conferred, together with the McKenna duties (also marked down for abolition) upon British industry. Safeguarding in Britain, it is pointed out, means fair trade, equal competition and steady employment for the workers. It has lead to an increase in the few safeguarded trades of some 74,979 workers in the number employed in the motor car, musical, photographic and scientific instruments industries and in the silk, leather, fabric, gloves and gas mantles manufactures. The extension of the principles it represents is pressed for by free traders of

the Manchester school, who have been convinced of its beneficial effects by its practical application in the industries affected. The removal of the safeguarding duties, it is further pointed out, will reopen the ports to dumped goods, which come into unfair competition with British manufactures and must, consequently, tend to reduce employment. Such considerations do not, however, appear to trouble Mr Snowden and his Socialist colleagues, who seem to be as indifferent to the claims of British manufacturers and industries as they are to those of the Empire at large. If so-called “Empire free trade” is to be placed on a successful basis, the principle of preference to British products must be cultivated and maintained. Recently reference was made in these columns to the West Indian sugar industry, which, as the result of the preference accorded to it by the liritish Government, is maintained on a sound business footing. The industry is the mainstay of the four colonies in which it is carried on, and, if preference is abolished, as Mr Snowden says it will.be, large numbers of workers in the West Indies win be thrown out of employment. At present British exports to the West Indies are valued at £0,000,000 per annum, and this, it is stated, represents the employment at £3 per week of 23,0U0 workers in Britain. The destruction of the West Indian sugar industry is predicted by Lord Olivier, the Socialist Secretary of State for India in 1924, who says emphatically that it “will come to an end in the course of 18 months if preference is abolished.” That means that this trade will be lost to Britain because (again in Lord Olivier’s words, as contained in his report to the Socialist Government this year) “the*whole of the labouring population” of the West Indies "will be thrown out of work.” That is, of course, a very serious matter and one that snould be the subject of very careful consideration at the Imperial Conference when it meets in October. Apart from the preference given to the West indies, there are some limited preferences accorded to certain products of the Dominions, the withdrawal of which would not possibly matter very greatly, but which in their withdrawal would certainly affect the cordial relationships which have existed under former Governments between Britain and the Dominions.

The Imperial Conference in October will have many knotty problems to deal with, not the least important being the questions associated with inter-imperial trade and British preferences, but if they are to be approached only from the British • Chancellor's standpoint of absolute free trade in all commodities and the abolition of preferential duties, it may be safely predicted that the outcome of tlie conference will be anything but satisfactory to the Dominions, and will largely alienate their sympathies with the Mother Country. Unity of counsels under such conditions is the last thing that can be expected. And that, again, raises the question of New Zealand’s representation at the conference. The Prime Minister, in the ordinary course of events, should attend ; but assuming that his health permits of his going, can lie leave New Zealand in its present unsettled political condition? Further, in what position is lie, as the leader of a minority party both in the House and the country, to speak for New Zealanders as a whole ?