OTTAWA AGREEMENTS

Northern Advocate, 7 November 1932, Page 5

OTTAWA AGREEMENTS

AUSTRALIAN DEBATE, PRIVATE BANKS ADMONISHED. POLITICAL TENDENCY. (Received 10.30 a.m.) CANBERRA, November 55. The postmastor-General, Mr A. Parkhill, in the House of Representatives, during the debate on the Ottawa agreements, warned the private banks that if they did not refrain from using political propaganda they might bo thrust into the “whirling eddies of the maelstrom of polities” from which would emerge only the one issue, the nationalisation of banking. During the debate Mr Beasley (Langite) quoted from and praised a circular issued by the Bank of Now South Wales criticising the Ottawa agreement. The Assistant Federal Treasurer, Senator Massy Green, who is acting chairman of the Loan Council, issued a statement in which he criticised the methods of the Premier of Now South Wales, Mr B. S. Stevens, at the last Premiers’ Conference. He alleged that Mr Stevens was trying to push the interests of the trading bank to the detriment of the national institution, and that other Premiers had every reason tc resist such action. The “Daily Telegraph” says that the statement has the endorsement of other Cabinet Ministers. Mr Stevens stated that his proposal to the conference was better'"’'than the Commonwealth Bank scheme which had been rejected. . Replying to Mr Greene, Mr Stevens said: “Surely no one will quarrel with the trading banks, which carry the bulk of the business activities of this country, when they offered to subscribe a large proportion of the loan at 10/per cent, less than the rate recommended by the Commonwealth Bank and the Commonwealth Government.”

MEAT DIFFICULTIES

ARGENTINA SHIPMENTS.

LONDON, November 5. There is satisfaction in Australian circles in London that the British Government has awakened to the meat difficulties Australia expounded at. Ot-

tawa. The object of the world conI ference is to carry on the present voluntary agreement with South America, which will expire in Juno, 1034. •Some doubt exists as to bow the agreement will affect foreign chilled beef, but the “Daily Express” says it will be subject to the same reductions as frozen meat. Messages from Argentina indicate that the Government is regulating shipments from there.