DUTY INCREASED

Taranaki Daily News, 10 November 1932, Page 5

DUTY INCREASED

BLOW TO IRELAND’S TRADE BRITAIN’S “ONLY COURSE” NON-PAYMENT OF. ANNUITY DUES TO BRITISH PUBLIC PARALYSIS OF BOUNTIES By Telegraph—Pres# Assn.— Copyright. London, Nov. 8. In the House of Commons, Mr. J. H. Thomas, Dominion Secretary, moving the approval of the new Irish duties, said that the Government had reluctantly imposed the first series of Irish duties owing to Mr. de Valera’s refusal io pay £5,000,000 a year in land annuities due to the British taxpayer. Receipts to date showed that Britain would not receive the full £5,000,000 and, therefore, other means had to be found. The Free State had retaliated by duties which had unquestionably affected England’s Irish trade in coal and other commodities, and had Caused unemployment in England. No other course was available than these new duties. Even at this stage they had not closed the door to a settlement, but felt,that this was the only action they could honourably adopt. Mr. Morgan Jones (Labour) regretted the continuation of the Anglo-Irish economic war, which was causing both sides to aufier. “As an exceptional measure could we not accept n chairman outside the Empire for an arbitrational tribunal to which the Free Stat® would be willing to consent 1” he asked.

Mr. Thomas recalled the Geneva agreement that Empire disputes must be settled by Empire tribunals. Th® resolution was carried by 256 votes to 37.

A Dublin cable states that there was a big rush of cattle from thp Free State to Ulster to escape the duties payable at midnight. Special trains were loaded to Capacity. Hundreds of other cattle were hurriedly driven over the border and left to graze on Ulster fields. Even the d© Valeraitcs admit that the new tariff will paralyse the system of bounties, whereby the Government is seeking to keep the export trade in cattle alive. They will have to be sold at give-away prices in the Free State, and probably 40 per cent, below British prices. Th® Irish Times calls on Mr. de Valera to have a general election without delay.

GOVERNMENT WILL NEVER PAY. jfR. DE VALERA’S DETERMINATION. Rec. 10 p.m. Dublin, Nov. 9. "As far as this Government is concerned the land annuities will never be paid,” declared'Mr. de Valera in the Fianna Fail Party’s annual conference. "We are not a lot of impossible people and we have not engaged in this conflict unwittingly. Fundamentally our people have no hatred for the British, but we hate tyranny and the attempts of people to dominate us when they have no right to dominate us. “We are prepared to live side by side with Britain -as neighbours on terms of equality and friendship, but we are not going to permit ourselves to be exploited.’ There are 80,000 cattle in the Free State now unexportable and w’hich must be sold internally at knock-out prices.