A. —sc.

Switzerland, Mr. Renggli (substitute, Mr. Lusser) ; Czechoslovakia, Mr. Necas (substitute, Mr. Kotek) ; Turkey, Mr. Sadak (substitute, Mr. Ilkin) ; Union of South Africa, Mr. Andrews ; Uruguay, Mr. Benavides ; Yugoslavia, Mr. Tzvetkovitch (substitutes, Mr. Krmpotitch, Mr. Petrovitch, Mr. Ostoyitch. Employers' Members. —Mr. Curcin (substitute, Mr. Zivadinovic), (Yugoslavia) ; Mr. Gerard (substitute, Mr. Bessem), (Belgium) ; Mr. Goldie (substitute, Mr. MacDonnell), (Canada) ; Mr. Harriman (substitutes, Mr. Wassernian, Mr. Paul), (United States of America); Mr. lonesco (substitute, Mr. Gusti), (Rumania) ; Mr. Junoy Rabat (substitute, Mr. Sanchez Conesa), (Spain) ; Mr. LambertRibot (substitute, Mr. Waline), (France) ; Mr. Oersted (Denmark) ; Mr. Schmidt (substitute, Mr. Camuzzi), (Austria) ; Mr. Szydlowski (substitute, Mr. Jastrzebowski), (Poland) ; Mr. Temperley (Australia) ; Mr. Tzaut (substitutes, Mr. Paillard, Mr. Kuntschen), (Switzerland) ; Mr. Yanek (Czechoslovakia) ; Mr. Wistrand (Sweden) ; Mr. Zilliacus (substitute, Mr. Sjoberg), (Finland). Substitutes : Mr. Cowley (Cuba) ; Mr. Etienne (Luxemburg). Workers' Members. —Mr. Amelink (Netherlands) ; Mr. Andersson (Sweden) ; Mr. Bondas (Belgium) ; Mr. Dash (New Zealand) ; Mr. Einer-Jensen (Denmark) ; Mr. Evensen (Norway) ; Mr. Flueras (Rumania) ; Mr. Hedges (United States of America) ; Mr. Jouhaux (France) ; Mr. Krier (Luxemburg) : Mr. Schiirch (Switzerland) ; Mr. Sherwood (British Empire) ; Mr. Stanczyk (Poland) ; Mr. Tallon (Canada); Mr. Yao Ting-Chen (China). Substitutes: Mr. Dumoulin (France); Mr. Chr. Jensen (Denmark). Observations on Work of Committee. The first recommendation and the resolution submitted from the Committee on public works are interdependent. One is of no value without the other. The second recommendation is closely allied. It recommends the application of certain principles in financing, timing, and planning public works, if they are to prevent excessive fluctuations of the business cycle. The information sought by the first recommendation would be relatively useless unless it concerned public works planned in accordance with the principles of the second recommendation. The nations most advanced in public-works planning are not far ahead of those that have not yet started. Therefore every nation has the opportunity of taking the lead in the application of these planning principles and in discovering new and better methods. These three proposals carry with them a request for immediate action by the Governing Body. The Public Works Committee was one of the largest of any in the Conference, being composed of thirty representatives of Governments, fifteen of employers, and fifteen of workers. These three proposals were approved by it without a negative vote, and with only one abstention. This is all the more remarkable because there were frank and searching debates and amendments to the original texts. To the Governments which did not participate in the debates the Committee pointed out three simple reasons why they should examine the proposals carefully at home : (1) No Government is asked to spend more on planned public works during the next decade, but only to time differently what it does spend ; (2) every Government is asked to spend relatively more in bad times than in good ; and (3) to share with other members its planning experience. The Committee considered these to be first steps, even though small, toward an international quarantine against the spread of the contagious disease of cyclical unemployment. The adoption of these Recommendations and of the Resolution, notwithstanding an attempt by the Austrian Government, supported by the Indian and Swiss Governments, to vitiate the force of the Recommendation concerning International Co-operation by eliminating all semblance of a common plan, marks the abandonment of the view once strongly put forward that public works have no value as a remedy for unemployment. It emphasizes that internationally the contention of the New Zealand Government is endorsed that maintenance of the purchasing power of the mass of the people is the best insurance against unemployment and depression. It is a reasonable conclusion, too, that many of those who were in opposition to this view during the depression have been convinced by experience of the danger of attempting to deal with possible future depressions by the methods so commonly used in the last»one. This explanation of an altered viewpoint born of the experience of the slump cannot of course be applied to all of the countries who supported, or at least did not vote against, the public works proposals at the Conference.

34