DUNEDIN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 12737, 10 August 1903, Page 5

DUNEDIN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE.

The retiring President of the Chamber of Commerce was .justly congratulated at tie annual meeting last Friday afternoon upon the able Teview he presented of the colony's trade for 1902. With a few •aspects of our commerce for the period in question-Mr Rattray indicated a certain amount of disappointment. He expressed some surprise over the shrinkage which, in comparison with the figures for the preceding year, the colony's imports showed. The circumstance is one he found difficult to reconcile with " the undoubtedly increasing purchasing powers' of the community." Is it so absolutely certain, however, as Mr Rattray ■'■ believes it to ; be, that tin purchasing powers of the people have increased? It may be granted that wages have increased, hut the experience of the hotisekeeper is that the prices of commodities have increased also to a large extent. And, upon the balance, it may be questioned whether a sovereign is able to purchase r.ore now

than it was a few years ago or i2 months ago. Mr Kattray regards with more equanimity than we can command tho serious diminution that, as statistics show, has occurred in tho flooks of tho colony, and we shall he delighted if his expectation that "we shall see agnin quite as many sheep in the colony as it can profitably carry "is speedily and completely fulfilled and if his sanguine disposition has not led;b:m to take an unduly optimistic view of the situation. His hopefulness is evidenced again in his belief that the movement for the construction of a new dock at Port Chalmers can bo successfully carried out upon the lines .iipon which it is at present projected. Mr Kenipthorne. tepk a less favourable view of tho scheme, demanding that, before, the public is irrevocably committed to it, satisfactory proof should be afforded that the. work can be accomplished for the figure which has beeu named ns an estimate of cost, and Maty when it is accomplished, it will prove profitable. There is another condition which should probably be iu.fiUed before the project is definitely entered upon, and that is that the functions .of the Dock Trust should be merged in those of the Harbour Board. By such an arrangement a considerable saving in expenses would, Mr Battray points out, be effected, and—more important still— ! the value of the security upon which the new dock construction loan would' be raised would be materially increased. Mr Battray find Mr Kempthorne concurred in expressing the opinion that the quickest mail service the colony can obtain should be maintained, but they both ignored the real objection there is to a renewal of the arrangement between the Government and Mr Spreckels: under wlu-'ii the San Francisco service is supplied.. Tin's is that it involves a. payment that, being in excels- of . Postal Union rates, is in the nature of a direct subsidy to a line which is already subsidised by a foreign country for the purpose of pushing its.trade in £he British colonies and which must maintain the service ih order to earn the subvention it receives from the United States, and, moreover, that the payment is designed to encourage the trading in these seas of vessels flying the flag of a nation that has prohibited British stea'iners trading in ifcj coastal watera. The patriotism of' tie majority of the residents of the colony cries out loudly against a policy which implies humble • submission to American legislation that is aimed at the destruction of the maritime supremacy of Great Britain m the Pacific ,ocean. With JMr Battray's protest ngainst the continued injustice thai is done to the Otago Central railway in the action of the Government in nllowing 40 per cent, of last year's parliamentary vote for the prosecution of tho work to lapse, we heed hardly say, wo cordially associate ourselves, while at the same time we recognise, With Mr Kempthorne, that the , mercantile community in Dunedin has not shown itself so much alive to the importance of the line as it .might have been expected to do. Upon the subject of the preferential tariff scheme, the discussion at Friday's meeting did hot throw any fresh light. Mr Rattray,. who deprecates criticism of Mr Chamberlain's,.proposals pending the results of the inquiry that is being instituted at. Home intp the 1 matter, lms nevertheless found 110 difficulty in.already forming an opinion favourable to the establishment: of preferential tariffs. But it is a very oile-sided arrangement into , which Mr Battray erpsots the project of the Secretary of State for the Colonies to develop. It-betokens, we imagine, a rather erro-

neoiis impression "of the state of public feeling at Home when a form of'reciprocity is described as "surely-feasible" Under which) in return for the free admission of colonial, products into the. United Kingdom, the colonies would hot concede any substantial reduction of their present trotaitive' duties on British manufactures but would consider their obligations discharged if they placed a surtax on foreign imports. The suggestion that'the colonies/will not be asked to make any heavy sacrifice'is, however, not supported by the speeches that have been made by Mr Chamberlain and his colleagues in England.' The , whole foundation of the preferential tariffs movement at Home consists in the belief that the colonies are prepared and, iudeed, anxious, to promote a closer union between themselves and the Mother Country by offering, in exchange for< corresponding advantages in the United Kingdom, tariff concessions to goods of, British manufacture. Moreover, the of the movement at Home are constantly representing the opinion of the colonies as being overwhelmingly favourable to the adoption of such a system. Mr Kempthorne voiced an impression that is widely entertained when he said that if the colonies were asked to sacrifice anything pertaining to thenindustrial pursuits they would return to Great Britain the .answer ; that they wished to be left alo-e.. That lesson is taught by experience, and it is also being emphasised to-day by the resolutions that are being passed by labour organisations in our own colony.. Nor is public opinion in New Zealand likely to conflict with public opinion in the other colonies. Certainly, the citation by Mr Fergus of Canada a colony that has not repented its action of 1897, and that, presumably, will accept with enthusiasm Mr Chamberlain's proposals, is, from his own point of view, somewhat unfortunate. Canada is very much in the position of the other colonies. She clings to an exclusive jurisdiction over her fiscal system, imposing duties on British as well .as on foreign wares and finding herself compelled to protect a brood of tariff-fed I native industries against British no less than against foreign competition. That being the case, it is safe to say, the Canadian correspondent of The Economist wrote a few weeks ago, that ' any arrangement. Mr Chamberlain might devise would be sure to generate friction and bad blood. . "To speak plainly," the correspondent added, " most well-informed Canadians fear the upshot woUld be, not the consolidation, hut, rather,, the early disruption of .the Empire." • '-,••■