FREER MARKETS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 365, 5 March 1932, Page 1

FREER MARKETS.

Britain’s Tariff Policy _ Reviewed. TRADE OUT OF GEAR. United Press Aesn.—By Electrto Telegraph—Copyright. RUGBY, March 3. The President of the Board ctf Trade, Mr Walter Runciman, made some interesting remarks on the new British tariff policy at the Foreign Press Association luncheon. He said that, having given the whole world an open market for so long, the rest of the world must not grudge Britain’s regulating her imports as other countries regulated theirs. He continued: “I never felt that we should do good either to ourselves or anyone else in the world by adding trade barriers blindly and without reason. There may be a good reason for now restricting the area of our free markets. I hope that it may be the precursor of freer markets, not only here but elsewhere. “It is sometimes necessary in the interests of good medicine to inoculate the patient with a disease something similar to that from which he is suffering. Tariff barriers may prove to be the only way by which tve can guide international trade into profitable channels. Dominions and Foreigners. “The Government is determined to make with the dominions during the summer and autumn arrangements for an increasing volume of Imperial trade, but that does not preclude them from making friendly arrangements foreign countries. I look forward to such arrangements with great hope.” He added that his personal view was that the only thing which would give the world a real stimulus was a cessation of those gigantic international payments which threw trade out of gear and hampered it on every hand.

ECONOMIC CONFERENCE.

LONDON, March 4. The Secretary for the Dominions (Mr J. H. Thomas) and other Ministers today received a deputation from th General Council of the Trades Union Congress, which sought information as to the possibility of the Ottawa Con ference considering the adoption of th proposals submitted jointly before th' Imperial Conference of 1930 by th Trades Union Congress, including th establishment of a permanent Commonwealth Economic Secretariat and organisation of a Commonwealth Trade Conference. Mr Thomas assured ‘the deputation of his unabated support of the principles contained in the joint document.

ARRESTING DEFLATION

TORONTO, March 4. An immediate international conference on the monetary position, with the object of arresting deflation and restoring prices to levels yielding a fair return to the primary producer, is urged by Mr Winston Churchill, in speaking here. Referring to the coming Imperial Economic Conference at Ottawa, he said that it was important to the prosperity of the British Empire, and to the world also, that the British Commonwealth should be strong and united.

The war in China would never have taken place if the British Navy had not been unduly weakened, mainly by the Washington Treaty, Mr Churchill said.