The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST” SATURDAY, JULY 22, 1939. Credit for New Zealand

Northern Advocate, 22 July 1939, Page 6

The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST”

SATURDAY, JULY 22, 1939. Credit for New Zealand

Registered for transmission through the post as a Newspaper

MR. NASH'S mission in London lias at last reached finality. After negotiations which must have been at times most exasperating and discouraging, he has managed to secure credits amounting to £9.000,000. Of this amount only £4,000,000 is for general purposes, the balance being earmarked for defence. it must be recognised, however, that extension of credits amounting to £5.000.000 for defence purposes represents a corresponding degree of relief to the - general sterling funds, and in effect frees that amount of money either for Government use or for general trading purposes. We congratulate Hr. Nash and the country ou the success so far achieved, which. howeAer, cannot be hailed with unalloyed satisfaction. It was a matter for regret,.in the first place, that New Zealand, after a period of buoyancy on the overseas markets, which in normal circumstances would have conferred genuine prosperity pii the country, and allowed it to stabilise both public and private ’finance, should have had to send an emissary to London. It is still more regrettable, as evidence of New Zealand’s sadly impaired financial prestige, that the credits given are hedged about with definite conditions. The import selection and control which Mr. Savage announced last December, as the first steps towards a “New Deal,” are henceforth to be subject, as is the creation of new industries, to conditions imposed by the British authorities. These stipulations, which •Mr. Nash must have accepted reluctantly, are not unreasonable from the British point of view. New Zealand was. in effect, approaching Britain with a request for financial aid in order to create new industries in opposition to Britain’s own industries. At the same time, New Zealand had, in British opinion, plainly violated the Ottawa Agreement by restrictive measures against British products. It now remains to be seen to what extent the industrial structure visualised in recent months by Mr. Savage will have to be modified. New Zealand, it is plain, must live within its means.