WAR DEBTS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 13 February 1933, Page 5

WAR DEBTS

QUESTION OF MODIFICATION AMERICAN ATTITUDE EUROPE MUST MAKE CONCESSIONS (United Press Association —By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) WASHINGTON, lltli February. Further crystallisation apparently of the American attitude that Europe must make concessions for any modification of debts seems indicated by various expressions to-da.v from bipartisan sources. Senator Lewis in a Senate speech called for cancellation of plans for a review of the British debt if it should he confirmed officially that Sir Ronald Lindsay has been instructed to inform the United States that Britain contemplates no quid pro quo. The Secretary to the Treasury, Mr Mills, in a speech at Kansas City tonight declared: “The American people are entitled to compensatory advantages for sacrifices they may ho called upon to make,” and insisted that “debtor nations can fairly he asked to make definite contributions to a common programme intended to remove barriers which now stand in the way of returning prosperity.” The Democratic leader of the House of Representatives, Mr Rainey, speaking before the Washington College of Law, declared that European suggestions of a 10 per cent, lump sum in settlement of debts would not he acceptable, and warned that repudiation would be an “unfriendly act” sure to he followed by “adequate measures of retaliation.”

Mr Silas Strawn in a Chicago radio address declared that organised business believed any fair settlement should assure access for American goods to European markets on a fair competitive basis.