DEVELOPMENT OF EMPIRE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18941, 12 February 1925, Page 9

DEVELOPMENT OF EMPIRE.

MR. AMERY'S APPEAL. POLICY OF CO-OPERATION. ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES. DISSIPATION IN THE PAST. COMPETITORS ASSISTED. Bj Telesraph—Press Association— Copyright (Received 8.5 p.m.) A. and N.Z.—Renter. LONDON. Feb. 10. Speaking at the Colonial Institute the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Mr. L. C. M. S. Amery, appealed to financiers and business men to use their power to bring profits to the Empire. He compared the growth of an Empire in which effort was dissipated with that of the United States which had concentrated the whole of her energies upon development. What the United States had done the Empire could do. He urged British people to give deliberate preference to Empire products. "There is only one way out- of the vicious circle of high costs involving unemployment," said Mr. Amery, " and that is by the construction of our whole economic system on a broad foundation of Empire co-operation. We have reached a point when the great idea of Empire development needed to be translated into the terms of a great policy. " The economic activities of Britain have been dissipated for three generations in building up the United States, the Argentine and European competitors, while they have contributed only incidentally to the growth of our own Empire." The Minister instanced as indicating the failure of the Empire compared with the United States that the total population engaged in agriculture in Britain and the Dominions was less than half the agricultural; population of France, and one-third that of the United States. The key to the whole position was the power of the market, which Britain possessed to a unique degree. Settlers would not cross oceans in order to grow produce which they could not selii, said Mr. Amery. He added: We cannot claim to be in earnest so long as we are not prepared to concentrate the power of our market on Empire development. The unreasoning prejudice regarding preferential duties constitute an additional reason for effective alternative action.