BRITISH CASE EXPLAINED

Taranaki Daily News, 19 July 1932, Page 7

BRITISH CASE EXPLAINED

DISPUTE OVER' ANNUITIES.

AGREEMENT FIVE YEARS ODD.

British Wireless. Rugby, July 16. The .position of the British Government regarding the Anglo-Irish negotiations is defined in a statement as .follows:— The dispute over land annuities which has given rise to the trouble relates to payments which the Free State Government agree'd to make some years ago and which hitherto have been regularly made, with th® sanction of the Free State Parliament. An Offer of arbitration was formally made to Mr. de Valera on June 10.■_ The Free State Government raised difficulties as to how the' court of arbitration could be constituted. Even on that, however, they came to no close negotiations with London. . . At tho last minute a proposal was nut to the British Government that the facts should be inquired into by a body of four, two appointed by the tree State Government and twd by the British Government. The novelty of this proposal lay in the fact that it was not proposed that the decision of thin body should have a bidding effect. When the four had drafted a report, or reports, the Governments were to negotiate, and no proposal Whs made, for a means of coming to an agreement should' the negotiations fail. The proposals, therefore, involved weeks, if not months, of talk, with no certainty of ah agreement at the end. In the meantime the relations between the Governments Would have been deteriorating. The British Government, anxious for a settlement of the annuities question, was willing for arbitration by a specially set up 'body, or for further discussions on whether direct contact could be maintained between the Governments. As a means of finding a settlement of the financial questions it proposed that the present situation of deadlock should be treated in the same Way in which money disputes are often treated in a law court —that th® payment's, contested should be made pending a decision, with the undertaking that those .payments should be the subject of dn ultimate Settlement, it was proposed that upon an agreement on the terms of reference for arbitration or further discussion, and upon the payment of the money involved, all present action should be suspended, including the collection of revenue by way Of special customs, and that the British Government was prepared,. so sodii as ~it received a communication from the Free btate Government to ifhis effect, to enter at once into such an agreement, and thus the dispute would be at an end.