ATTACK ON THE BANKS

Taranaki Daily News, 23 March 1935, Page 9

ATTACK ON THE BANKS

FINANCE IN DOMINIONS. LABOUR MEMBER’S ASSERTION. London, March 12. . An attack on ’ British banks, in their relations to Dominion borrowers, was made in the House of Commons to-day by Mr. Aneurin Bevan, Labour M.P. for Ebb Vale, in the course of the debate on the finance clauses of the India Bill. Mr. Bevan said that British financial policy had resulted in the practical ruin of the colonial world. Only recently, he asserted, Britain had compelled Austi'alians to accept a lower standard of life in the interests of British bondholders. Sir Edward Grigg (Conservative): The Commonwealth has been absolutely responsible for its own finance for 30 years. Mr. Bevan said the Labour Party contended that no nation was self-governing where financial power was in private hands. Mr. J. H. Thomas, Secretary of State for the Dominions, said he only intervened because Mr, Bevan might be quoted in Australia. His mis-statement could not be allowed to pass. He surely knew that, so far as the finance of any Dominion was concerned, that Dominion was absolutely responsible for it. Every Dominion Government would speak well of the financial facilities which London had given them.