IMPERIAL CONFERENCE

Waipa Post, Volume 44, Issue 3178, 17 May 1932, Page 6

IMPERIAL CONFERENCE

" If our aggregate of trade is to be enlarged our Imperial policy must be flexible enough to allow us to take advantage of any special opportunities that may arise outside the Empire," says a writer in The Round Table. "It would be foolish to shut out the rest of the world for ever , from advantages which the members of the Commonwealth accord to each other. " Since the British market is as important to the foreigner as the foreign market is to Great Britain, we should fear tariff retaliation not so much for its direct injury as for the harm it would do to wor.d trade as a whole, but the repercussions upon our own position would be serious enough. Moreover, our Imperial ties would be no more than fetters if, while.suffering all the disadvantages of protection, we were to be prevented from reaping its benefits in securing special concessions from foreign countries on the strength of the bargaining power that it would afford. " That is especially true at the present moment, when the negative success of traditional commercial policy in securing ' tariff disarmament' has driven many countries to seek a way out through customs unions and preferential systems. The Scandinavian countries, for instance, followed Great Britain in abandoning the gold standard, and are now putting their heads together for the development of a common trading policy in which, sooner or later, they are bound to invite Great Britain's co-operation; together, they rank as our best single c omers, and for their part they are dependent on the British market mat they are bound offer advantageous terms which, desirable as it may be to divert some of our demand for their products toward Canada, Ireland and New Zealand—not to mention our own home producers—we should at least be in a position to consider. " The attachment—in their own interest—of so many countries to sterling in spite of its inconvertibility into gold has been remarkable, and might be employed to organise a new international exchange system which would avoid some of the perils of the post-far gold standard; if nothing is done in the meantime, Ottawa will an opportunity for taking a first step in that direction. " But to leave all foreign countries out of a sterling union would be a grave error, yet it would almost inevitably follow if the new system of Imperial Preferences were to be aggressively directed against the rest of the world and were to forbid prei ferential arrangements outside the boundaries of the Empire. " It is to be hoped that the Government will bear in mind the importance of not unduly tying their hands at Ottawa for negotiation with foreign countries."