ARMS TRAFFIC

Southland Times, Issue 22487, 24 November 1934, Page 5

ARMS TRAFFIC

QUESTION OF CONTROL.

“UNFORTUNATE SPEECH.”

(United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright.) (Rec. 5.5 p.m.) London, November 22. In the House of Commons Sir John Simon, referring to his recent speech on the arms traffic, said he desired in all sincerity to express consciousness that the speech had not conveyed the impression he had wished. Judging it not by the exact words, but by the impression created about it outside, he admitted that it must be described as an unfortunate speech. . Sir John Simon went on to point out that it was at his suggestion that the subject of the control of the arms traffic was again raised at Geneva a few months ago. He was now glad to say that there was to be an opportunity for co-operating with the United States on the question. It was only fair to say that the Government had persistently worked for an arms convention, and there now seemed to be a much better prospect of obtaining one than ever before. The Government would quite willingly hold an inquiry into the questions of whether a State monopoly would be preferable to private manufacture and the means which ought to be adopted to prevent abuses in the sale of arms abroad.

Speaking In the House of Commons on November 8, Sir John Simon, replying to a suggestion that arms should be manufactured by the State, said that a private armaments firm had its skilled staff, its organization and its machinery which was producing a certain quantity of armaments, and that side of its business could not in fact be maintained without foreign orders. If they were to be plunged into the calamity of war, then these armament firms and private shipyards, owing to their previous organization and their acquired aptitude, were able to switch over very rapidly from their level of peace production to their maximum war production. That was the essence of this arrangement, and only by that means was it possible to bridge the gap, which widened at a terrific rate once war again visited the world, between peace production and demand. It was the need for sudden almost unlimited expansion in time of war which made the conception of a Government monopoly so difficult to apply. Whatever might be the lessons which ought to be drawn from the late war, he could not think they ought to put their trust In State factories and wait until they were in war before anyone else was called upon-