EMPIRE PREFERENCE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19203, 20 June 1924, Page 5

EMPIRE PREFERENCE

CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS. DEBATE IN THE COMMONS. THE RESOLUTIONS DEFEATED Pros* Association —By Telegraph—Copyßebt. LONDON, Juno 18. (Received June 18, at 5.5 p.m.) Tho four resolutions in favour of granting preference to Empire products were negatived as follows; —• ' Tor Against Dried fruits Wines 268 fob Sugar 263 280 Tobacco 271 zB4 Tho remainder of the resolutions were withdrawn. —A. and N.Z. Cable. THE DEBATE RESUMED. A CLOSE DIVISION. LIBERAL PARTY DIVIDED. LONDON, Juno 18. Mr Wedgwood (Labour) said the Labour Party seriouslv believed that tho lines on which, it proposed to proceed were more lilmlv to secure the permanent unity ot the Empire than tho Conservative policy. On Mr Wedgwood's suggestion that Frotection in many of the colonies and foreign countries led to corruption and graft, Mr G. E. W. Bower (Cun.) asked tho Speaker whether Mr Wedgwood had the right to make this insinuation against tho dominion paliamentarians. The Speaker replied that ho Lad heard nothing personal. Mr Wedgwood said ho had certainly made no personal charges whatever. Mr R. R. Pilkington (Liberal), speaking as one who bad lived in Australia for 27 years, denied that tbo increase of British exports to Australia was due to Preference. A vital objection to Prefermice was that the consumer in Britain would he taxed in order to provide a cash subsidy for the dominion producers. The Australian market did not dominate tho price of any article manufactured m Britain ; consequently tho British _ manufacturer did not get a better price because of Australian Preference. As a beginning, tariffs might bo applied to a few industries, but they would inevitably be extended until the burden would bo too great for tho consumers to bear, and the end would bo disastrous for all parts of the Empire. Industries which grew up under tariffs would become derelict when tho tariffs were discarded.

(Received June 19, at 8.35 p.m.) Mr Baldwin, resuming tho debate, said that the European, Japanese, and American markets were closed rigidly against Britain, and the only countries with which wo could make treaties offering prospects of improving our trade were the dominions. He expressed the opinion that the defeat of the resolutions would not be a breach of faith because Parliament was supreme in these matters, but it would be a stupid act. Was it not possible to enter into an arrangement with' the dominions whereby the enormous quantity of foodstuffs which Britain required might be obtained solely from dominions at cost price and distributed with the least possible margin of profit? If tho resolutions as a whole were defeated it would gravely imperil the future of the Empire. Mr Asquith said that the resolutions were an attenuated, emasculated, anaemic, and even apocryphal, version of the fullblooded gospel of Imperial Preference. What conception of Empire must people have who believed that the rejection of the resolution dealing with fruits ana honey would imperil the stability of the Empire? MR MACDONALD’S SPEECH.

Mr MacDonald declared that he did not believe that the Australians and Canadians wanted Britain to change her fiscal system. By Preference Australia meant keeping up the tariff wall, but lowering it slightly in Britain’s favour against the foreigner. While wo were grateful to Australia, and Canada for taking down one or two bricks in the wall, we ought not to come to the fallacious conclusion that the dominions intended Imperiel Preference as a first step to Free Trade within the Empire. It had been suggested that the Government was encouraging trade with foreign intended Hike R'ossia and discouraging trade with our own kith and kin. That was untrue. Xo one could feel very happy in discussing these preference resolutions. Ho was not happy, and he was much afraid what was said might be misrepresented in the dominions. He referred at length fo the schemes for assisting emigration to Australia for which large sums were .being found. The British' Government was trying in these ways to bring the dominions nearer the Motherland. ME LLOYD GEORGE’S ATTITUDE. The intervention of all the party leaders except Mr Lloyd George partly atoned for tho dullness of the. opening day’s debate. There were many comments on Air Lloyd George’s absence, but it was announced that he had an engagement and had paired in favour of the" first four resolutions increasing tho preference to Lmpiro goods on the existing duties on figs, raisins, plums, currants, tobacco, and wine, and also establishing the preference on Empire sugar at id a pound for a decade. He also paired against the rest. ME ASQUITH AMUSES THE HOUSE. The main point in Mr Baldwin’s speecn was an appeal to separate the resolutions into two categories and agree to the first iour as imposing no new duties, but Mr Asquith rejected the appeal. In the opening phrases of his speech ho confessed frankly that he could riot Ih.g himself into excitement over any of the resolutions. The most telling passage in his speech was the following analysis of the 10 resolutions‘Three of them deal with dried fruits, three with apples, honey, and limejuice—(laughter)—ami one with various forms of canned peaches.—(Laughter.) When I read them in all their pompous array on tho Order Paper 1 was reminded of the Bagdad vendor who perambulated tho streets of Bagdad shouting ’ln the name of the Prophet, figa. ’ ~(Loud Liberal and Socialist laughter.; Baldwin had said that the rejection of the resolutions would imperil tile Empire. If this were true what conception must people have of the stability of the Empire ’! THE LIBERALS DIVIDED. Later in tho debate it was evident that apart from Mr Lloyd George the Liberal leader did not carry all his party with him. Mr H. A. L. Fisher (ex-Mini-ster of Education) said that Imperial Preference o, a grand scale was a practical impossibility, but he proposed to vote for tin resolutions which imposed no new duties. Major Church (Labour) advanced similar arguments to Mr Fisher’s. The. Rcy. Campbell Stephen promised Mr Baldwin the support of all Labourites if be would give an assurance that his Empire policy bo one of national buying and marketing of all .surplus colonial produce to the exclusion of the parasitical middleman. Mr W. Brass (Con.) said that although lie was a Free Trader he proposed to vote for the first four resolutions. He thought Britain should make a gesture to the dominions to help the Empire settlement schemes. Mr H. H. Spencer (Lib.) said he ha-' served as a “Tommy” in the Australian Force, but he had never heard his fellows base loyalty to the Empire upon Imperial Preference. Mr Spencer, who is a Bradford woollen manufacturer, said he had a new suit made of Australian “Botany” wool in order to enforce the argument that when he endeavoured to sell some of the cloth he found that Holland and Denmark had a tariff thereon of 5 per cent., Switzerland 6 per cent., Sweden and France 10 per cent., but Australia had a tariff of 30 per cent, on cloth made from her own wool.