LIBERTY AND PROGRESS

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 2, Issue 231, 30 October 1940, Page 7

LIBERTY AND PROGRESS

UNDER BRITISH FLAG -COLONIES DO f, NOT. PAY"/-TAXES TO MOTHERLAND? Do you know that no part of the British Empire pays taxes or tribute in any form to Britain? Every penny of the money raised ; 3)y taxes in the Colonies and Dojminions is spent upon the-inhabi-tants themselves. Hitler and tMussolini are 1 , trying to persuade the world that the people of Great Britain "own" a quarter of the earth and sit at case -while the "enslaved" races oL the Empire SAvedt and work for the sole proiit "of the British people. They know • that this is false. Do you? IDo you know the following facts? 'Instead of drawing taxes from the the taxpayers of Britain help to keep them • going,, In. 1940 —in theftfuTaie of the greatest war in Act of Parliament iwas passeS providing that over £11 : millions which had been lent to Col- . onies in ,past years should be con~verted into .free gifts* The same Act enables another millions, spread.over 10 years, to be ■ given to the Colonies to help them to develop their own resources and improve their standards of living. No part of the ,l>riitsh Empiie is -obliged to buy what it needs from Britain or to sell its own products ■to Britain. Full advantage is taken of this freedom. For example, the British •Colonies buy only 25 per cent, ot' their imports from Britain. More than half of their trade is .with Foreign Countries. There is almost twice as much British capital invested in the Ar- ■ vgentine, a single foreign country, as in all the British Colonies put together. ■ British India, which Hitler and Mussolini say is "owned" by us, buys less than one-third of her total, imports from Britain. In the whole of 1 British India, which has a population of about 275 millions, there are only 715 European Civil Servants and 450 officers of the Police Service. All the rest, numbering many thousands, are Indians. Even in the highest ranks Indians serve on terms of complete equality with their British colleagues. Internal order and the defence ot t North-West Frontier against raiding tribes are maintained (in pea6e time) by'a voluntary army of 610,000 officers and men, wi'-Ji 34,000 reservists. Of these only 60,--000 are British troops. * ' ijnder the Constitution, all tile Provinces of British India manage their own affairs, with elected Parliaments and Cabinets of Indian Ministers who are responsible to those Parliaments.

The whole British Empire employs fewer British officials than the total number of persons employed ih Cadbury's, Rowntree's and Wills's factories. i'|; ' - . ? : ,lThe self-governing Dominions {Canada, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand and Eire) are free and , equal partners with Great Britain. She lias no control over their actions and policy at home or abroad. They maintain, wherever they wish) diplomatic representatives of . their own ati Foreign Courts and iriaie treaties with Foreign Powers. When the Dominions (except Eire who remained neutral) declared .wai on Germany in September, 1939, they did so entirely of their own free will. The British Commonwealth of Nations is a gigantic experiment in internationalism. It consists of (a) a group of completely independent nations, working together in free association, (b) others, such as India and Burma, which are rapidly " approaching the same status, and (c) a collection of Colonies and Pro lectorates, which are being guided and assisted along the same ron.d towards the same goal. It is a world-wide association, Iff--•eluding white, brown, yellow and black member-States. Its basis is not, as Hitler and Mussolini would have the world believe, tyranny .-and exploitation, but liberty and progress. ' i \