Fiji Linked With Canada

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 995, 11 June 1930, Page 8

Fiji Linked With Canada

PROPOSAL BY LATE GOVERNOR A PLAN that the Fiji Islands should petition the Dominion of Canada to accept them as a maritime province of that Dominion has been put forward by Sir Eyre Hutson, who

retired from the Governorship of the Fijis last year. Writing to the “Morning Post,” London, Sir Eyre points out the advantage of such a union, which would be to ensure financial protection of a rich and powerful sister able to provide a free market for Fiji’s staple export—sugar.

“Having served in four of the West Indian sugar-producing Colonies, and also in Mauritius and Fiji, and being in fully accord with the views expressed by Lord Olivier in reference to the position of the sugar industry in the West Indian Colonies, 1 realise that the recent leading articles in the 'Morning Post’ have been sincerely appreciated by all those interested in those old and fervently loyal possessions of the Crown,” Sir Eyre Hutson remarks.

“The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Philip Snowden, when speaking, in February, on the subject of the report of the Sugar Commission, plac-

arded himself as a rabid adherent to Cobdenism and as a ‘little Englander' when he essayed to shelve the question by stating that it would be im practicable for Great Britain to ‘carry’ the sugar industry in the Colonies' under reference, including Mauritius and Fiji and he gave as his reason an assumption on his part that the present position has been caused by world over-production of sugar. "Reference was made by him to the only alternative to be adopted, viz.:

The establishment of new industries in the place of the cultivation of sugar cane. The alternative suggestion, is, of course, of no value. “The Governments of the United States of America, of France, and Holland consider it to be a wise policy to ‘carry’ the industries of their colonial possessions and protectorates by the imposition of high protective import Customs duties,” Sir Eyre says. “On that policy rests the financial stability of their colonial possessions, particularly in regard to their sugar industry. “Should his Majesty’s Government be so short-sighted as to ignore the strong recommendations of the Sugar Commission, there is the following alternative, one which I have supported for years: “The financial position of the British West Indies for the last thirty years or more has been assisted by the Customs preference duties granted by the Dominion of Canada to products imported into the Dominion being the bona-fide products of British possessions. In order to secure free entry of those products from the British West Indies into Canada, it would be to the great advantage of those colonies were they to combine and to seek permission of his Majesty’s Government to petition the Dominion of Canada to accept them as Maritime Provinces of the Dominion. “They would thereby come under the financial protection of a rich and progressive sister, who is in a position to give them that protection which their Mother is unable to offer them. That action on their part need not, and will not, I am confident, diminish or affect in any manner the fervent loyalty of those old colonies to the Crown and to their Mother Country. “Fiji would be well advised to follow the same course," counsels Sir Eyre. “Mauritius, which is to all intents and purposes an Indian colony, and which receives no protection in the sugar market of the Union of South Africa, may move to become a maritime province of India.”