SHIPPING LAWS.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXII, Issue 4847, 27 December 1902, Page 5

SHIPPING LAWS.

Apropos of the Commonwealth Qo*oJ ernment’s reported intention of pur* hibiting foreign shipping from engaging; in trade between one Australian port and another, the London “Daily Chronicle” remarks: “The first fruits o£j the Colonial Conference in the way of! practical legislation aro promised by ■ Australia. Mr Soddon wanted the Im- 1 perial Parliament to treat America and some other foreign as they treat us, hy making every portion of the British Empire ‘coastal,’ and ing foreign shipping trade between any' two or more ports within our Empiro. The conference decided ‘that the attention of the Governments of the ooloniea and the United Kingdom rinaiM bo called’ to this matter. Thb Commonwealth Government has long bad its ‘attention ’ called in the direction of legislating against foreign competition <m the Australian coast, and only last year created a good deal of irritation among foreign traders hy Customs regulation# intended to hamper their operations. The new legislation proposes to do directly what was then attempted indirectly. The shipping linos aimed at are principally the German, French and American, which, with the assistanon V,f heavy Government subsidies, compete in the Australian trade with such line# as the P. and O. and Orient Companies and the Australian-owned inter-State lines. Of course the new legislation i» admittedly a disguised form of protection.”