The Timaru Herald MONDAY, AUGUST 31, 1936 RECEPTION OF NEW ANGLO-EGYPTIAN TREATY.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLII, Issue 20510, 31 August 1936, Page 8

The Timaru Herald MONDAY, AUGUST 31, 1936 RECEPTION OF NEW ANGLO-EGYPTIAN TREATY.

If the unprecedented warmth of feeling being shown by cheering crowds of Egyptians towards Britain, can be regarded as a guarantee that definitely stated obligations will be honoured on both sides, English newspaper opinion will be justified, in a measure, in describing the Anglo-Egyptian treaty as another witness to the more Ibieral attitude of Britain, both in her foreign relations and her Imperial policy, which on the whole, has prevailed since the war. It is, of course, one thing to make treaties and quite another matter to have them solemnly and consistently observed. As a matter of fact, Europe seems to be in for an orgy of treaty breaking. The people in many countries have witnessed solemn treaties reduced to mere scraps of paper, thus bringing down the wall of defence, they thought they had raised with treaties, like a pack of cards. Herr Hitler’s steel-helmeted warriors had scarcely finished their occupation of the forbidden Rhineland zone, when little Austria declared herself no longer bound by armament restrictions, and Turkey announced that she intended io re-fortify the Dardanelles. Both were following the bad example set by Japan and Italy, who rode rough-shod through several treaties in the armed invasion they conducted respectively in China and Abyssinia. With Hungary and Bulgaria eager to emulate Austria and with Germany and Italy pursuing their imperialistic aims in connection with the revolution in Spain, both the political set-up and the legal structure established by the Versailles settlement and other treaties, are challenged as never before. The terms of the friendly alliance concluded under the Anglo-Egyptian treaty are regarded by some sections of the English press as opening up a new era in the relations between the two countries. But the treaty itself, in relation to Britain’s place in the world has been accorded a somewhat mixed reception. This was inevitable, because of the two schools of thought in the Old Land — one reposing implicit faith in the League of Nations and the efficiency of treaties, and the other, fearful lest Britain in making concessions to Egypt, may be risking too much to gain the good will of the Egyptian people. “The Treaty,” says The Morning Post} “weakens Britain’s capacity to protect Egypt at the very moment when it ought to be strengthened.” The Times, on the other hand, insists that “the treaty has converted an uneasy, unequal and uncertain association of the last eighteen years, into a friendly alliance between two equally independent and sovereign states.” Such a summing up of the real significance of the new treaty, would be wholly satisfying but for the fear that is now lurking round the shores of the Mediterranean, lest Italian aggression and intrigue may innocnlate Egypt and imperil the safety of the Commonwealth of British Nations. Egypt is to-day, what it always has been, one of the world’s pivotal spots. Geographically, it is the land bridge between Asia and Africa; likewise, since the cutting of the Suez Canal 65 years ago, Egypt is the water gate between the East and the West. To control that seaway to India and the Far ast, is for Britain a vital necessity, since the Mediterranean is the jugular vein that carries the life blood of Britain and India and her Overseas Dominions in the Pacific. Only the future will show the wisdom or otherwise of the surrender of British interests in Egypt to that country’s inflamed nationalism. But the stern facts of the situation in Europe and Asia confronts us with uncertainty associated with treaties; indeed, all the moves in those troubled scenes point a moral to the query: When is a treaty a working treaty? The answer, of course, is (and this applies to the new Anglo-Egyptian Treaty): when it is a genuine contract, and not otherwise.

DOMINION’S FAVOURABLE TRADE BALANCE.

From almost every avenue, streams of increased revenue are pouring into the Dominion and into the national purse, through vastly improved internal and oversea trade. Last year, the Dominion’s wool cheque exceeded £10,000,000 compared with a little more than £4,000,000 the previous year. This in itself gave a livelier pulse to internal business. The rise in the price levels of other products has also helped substantially to restore normal economic conditions in the Dominion. And now the oversea trade figures for the month of July, which have just been issued, reveal the growing magnitude of the Dominion’s favourable trade balance. In July, 1934, the Dominion suffered an actual deficiency on the oversea trading of £16,000. So rapid has been the economic recovery, due to improved prices for the Dominion’s products that last month, New Zealand’s favourable trade balance reached the substantial sum of £1,149,000; in other words, more than a million for a single month, compared with £271,000 in the corresponding period last year. Moreover, the returns for the seven months ended on July 31, disclose a favourable trade balance of £15,520,000 compared with £10,662,000 in the corresponding period last year. It is just as well, therefore, in view of the claims of the politicians, to point to the favourable oversea trade balance firstly, because of the rather foolish assertions that are made from time to time that the state of the Dominion’s oversea trade has no relation to the country’s internal economy; and secondly, because of the tendency of the Government to claim for itself the whole of the credit for the improved financial and economic position of the Dominion, which, of course, bears the closest relationship to the improved oversea prices.

RECOGNITION OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

Recognition of the value of scientific research has been made during the past few days, and of all the branches of human activity, it is at least one in which the State can interest itself for the general good. One interesting step taken recently relates to the manufacture of butter and cheese, and an officer of the Commonwealth Council of Scientific and Industrial Research is io undertake work at the Dairy Research Institute at Palmerston North. Such an appointment which is a compliment to the research facilities that have been tardily provided in this country, might well yield valuable results. The discovery of refrigeration it? might be noted, was a most important factor in the progress of (lie Dominions, and if research can go further ami place New Zealand butter on the Home market with a quality equal to Danish, a discovery which, to the New Zealand dairy farmer, might have more economic utility than mere price manipulations, would have been made. In Hie long run, quality must affect prices, and in the light of ordinary logic, it would seem that the only way New Zealand can possibly exert any control over oversea prices would be by supplying the best quality produce; against rapidly improving products on a widely competitive market, quality counts in the end. Denmark cannot have so regularly obtained high butter prices for no reason at all; the reason is known.