EMPIRE TRADE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LVI, 26 April 1923, Page 5

EMPIRE TRADE

DOMINION PREFERENCE COMING ECONOMIC CONFERENCE (By Electric Telegraph —Copyright). (Australian & N.Z. Cable Association). LONDON, April 24. The Lord-Mayor of London, presiding over a meeting of the Empire Development Union at the Mansion House, said that all classes ought to combine to make the forthcoming Imperial Economic Conference successful as' a starting point for a new great development of trade enterprise throughout the Dominions. The latter were anxious to cooperate, and during the last quarter of a century they had gone far ahead of the Motherland in promoting inter-Im-perial trade relations. Viscount Long said the Union was not formed to oppose but to help the Government In strengthening mter-Im-perial commercial: ties. This did not mean the abandoning of Britain's longestablished trade policy, but within limits that policy could offer the Dominions extended opportunities for trade development. Curiously enough, the only resistance he knew of to an extension of Imperial, federation of trade came from those who argued it was the Government's duty to secure the best possible standard of life for the wage-earning classes, and the application of the principles of preferential duties in favour of the Mother Country. Preference' which began in Canada *a quarter of ft century ago and had been supported bv other dominions and had steadfastly continued to increase despite the profoundly regrettable absence of practical response from the Motherland. They rejoiced in the Dominions' preferences to Britain. The hand the Dominions were now holding out should, be' firmly grasped in order that the Empire should become one in name and fact. Migration and land settlement schemes were useless unless emigrants commanded the markets here, giving a fair return for labour. This is attainable by Britain's adoption of' a carefully thought out policy of Imperial preference, not by the reversal but by the extension of present Imperial trade policy. ' .