PREFERENTIAL DUTIES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17614, 2 May 1919, Page 4

PREFERENTIAL DUTIES.

A scheme of British tariff reform, involving tho introduction of preferential duties, is, jj,s Wets to have foosn expected, an interesting feature of the Budget presented in the House of Commons bj r Mr Austen Chamberlain, Chancellor of the Eiehsguer. groforenc© ' in

favour of the countries which are to be entitled to it is apparently to be provided by the simple expedient of increasing tlio duties on tho articles affected that will bo imported from other countries. It is difficult to see in these circumstances upon what ground tho Chancellor's expectation of a heavy loss of Customs revenue is based. Probably, however, the cabled summary of the Budget speech is as misleading on this point as it is certainly meagre. Tho articles in respect of which preferential duties are to be imposed do not make a very comprehensive list. While tlio principle of preference is itself debateable, it is to the inclusion of tea, cocoa, sugar, and tobacco in the list that exception will principally be taken to the scheme in detail. It may be anticipated that the application of the system of preferential duties to these articles, all of them largely consumed, will have the effect of increasing the price of them to the consumers, and for this reason there can be little doubt that it will be warmly opposed. Such foodstuffs as meat and grain, it will be seen, are not included within the scope of the scheme. Neither is wool. If the producers and exporters of these articles in Australia and New Zealand entertained any hope that preferential duties would be imposed on them they will be disappointed. But there would have been a tremendous outcry in the Mother Country against any proposal that would have meant an increase in the price of bread and of meat. The Chancellor of the Exchequer could hardly ignore the consideration that any measure of tariff reform which would have raised the prices of necessaries of life such as these would be intensely unpopular, mosrt of all at the present time when the cost of living at Home is still more than double what it was in 1914. He has taken a bold step indeed when he has included tea, sugar, cocoa, and tobacco in the list of articles in respect of which preferential duties are to be imposed. It is worthy of note, as illustrative of the huckstering spirit which the introduction of a system of tariff preferences is apt to produce even in what Lord Milner recently described as a family of nations, that a suggestion to the Federal Minister, of Customs yesterday that British manufactures should be preferentially treated in the Australian .tariff was bluntly met with the assertion that if this were done a " quid pro quo" would have to be granted by the Imperial Government.