THE OTTAWA AGREEMENTS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 89, Issue 225, 22 September 1945, Page 4

THE OTTAWA AGREEMENTS

TN any general revision of world trading conditions it is inevitably that the Ottawa Agreements should be brought up for discussion and possible revision. At the time of the Ottawa Conference proposals were advanced to ring-fence the Empire in order to provide for the Commonwealth a domestic, market comparable to that provided the United States by its own high tariff wall. That tariff wall was a mistake for the United States and it may well be argued that the. Ottawa Agreements were a series of mistakes for Hie United Kingdom. The general recovery which the world as a whole experienced after the agreements were signed led to the supporters of the. agreements to claim that subsequent results justi'ird the work of the .Ottawa Conference. Fortuitous happenings do not constitute a good defence of policy any more than a fine lay justifies the city in dcclan’ing it a holiday a fortnight preiously. The Ottawa Agreements did do something to give to the innufaeturers of the United Kingdom a tentative advantage in he markets of the Dominions, but on the whole the United Kinglorn may not be as pleased with the results as Lord Beaverbrook could lead the world to imagine. Certainly they provided for the ■’.mpire no foundation, cither economic or of any other kind, for ‘lie Empire had been in existence long before the Ottawa Conference was thought of. hi New Zealand the signature of Mr. Coates ■fas hardly dry upon the Ottawa Agreement when lie returned and hnplemented a currency depreciation policy which nullified any ■advantage the United Kingdom manufacturer might, have had in ompetition witli Now Zealand manufaeturers. The United Kinglorn Government generously conceded at the time that the management of this Dominion’s currency was its own affair, but the United Kingdom manufacturers wore more realistic in their outlook and there can be no doubt that New Zealand goodwill in the homeland was considerably impaired . Nothing drastic has happened since, but the impairment of goodwill remains and when the present United Kingdom Government, in its search for avenues for providing employment for its work-people, finds its interests clashing with those of New Zealand, there is a possibility that this Dominion will wish that its past history in commerce had not been blemished.