PAPER SUPPLY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26782, 27 May 1948, Page 5

PAPER SUPPLY

BRITISH GOVERNMENT CONCERNED

LOWER IMPORT RATE LONDON, May 25. The President of the Board of Trade, Mr Harold Wilson, said in the House of Commons to-day that the newsprint supply position Was causing the Government great concern. The newspapers were consuming about 355,000 tons a year, but as a result of the cuts made in 1947, imports of Canadian and Newfoundland newsprint were about 104,000 tons against 180,000 tons previously contemplated. The main feature of the present position was the lower rate of imports and the extremely low level of domestic stocks. Mr Wilson said it would be wrong to pledge a definite programme for a Canadian newsprint order and place in greater danger the supplies of foodstuffs and other essentials. Britain's newsprint supplies in 1949 from all sources should enable the present consumption rate to be fully covered, even if an increase was not possible.' Larger Newspapers “It is not possible to say what size British newspapers will be in 1949,” he said. “If the dollar position meant less newsprint from North America in 1949 that did not mean a cut in newspaper sizes.” *: Mr Wilson said the Governments ambition was to increase the sizes of newspapers from the present four pages ,a day to an alternating four pages one day and six pages the next as soon as possible. He hoped that this would be done in 1949 if it were possible without the sacrifice of food and a further drain on gold and dollars. Mr Wilson announced an increase m newsprint supply to periodicals by 31 per cent. Britain’s Place as Consumer Mr Oliver Lyttelton (Con.) said that Britain occupied twentieth place among the 21 nations which were the principal users of newsprint. Japan,was last. Mr Lyttelton compared the £2,500,000 worth of dollars which the newspapers wanted to spend in 1949 on Canadian and Newfoundland newsprint with the £2,000,000 Britain was spending annually on American books and periodicals. Mr H. W. Harris (Ind.) said that it emerged from the Royal Commission on the press that the greatest evil the press was suffering was a shortage of newsprint. Democracy at present must be instructed, and inevitably the newspapers could not give both sides of a case adequately. There was a lamentable reduction of foreign news.