DUTY FREE GOODS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 903, 26 October 1933, Page 11

DUTY FREE GOODS.

One Effect of New Trade Agreement. (‘•Star” Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, October 26. It was stated by Mr Coates in the House last night that a provision in the new agreement with Australia will have the effect of making a reduction of at least 15 per cent ad valorem in duty and (or) sales tax chargeable in Australia in the case of goods exempt f r om ordin ary duty, such as timber, fi :li hides, skins and agricultural seeds, which bore one or both of these taxes. The effect of the new provision will be to make them actually free of duty and sales tax. Duties lower than those in force un der the British preferential tariff had been granted on certain lines of Australian goods, principally cottonseed meal, hay, chaff, oats, dried peas, fish, fish pastes and soups, wine, eucalyptus oil, chamois leather, vacuum pumps for milking machines, certain oil engines and timber. With the exception ot cottonseed meal and eucalyptus oil,, which were not made in New Zealand, and dressed timber, the duties on these goods will'be the same in Australia as in New Zealand. As a measure of protection for New Zealand industries the duties on many classes of Australian goods have been fixed at rates higher than those in force on similar United Kingdom goods.