N.Z. GIFT PARLELS ARE APPRECIATED BY PETERSFIELD

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 14, Issue 13, 18 July 1949, Page 5

N.Z. GIFT PARLELS ARE APPRECIATED BY PETERSFIELD

The gratitude of the people of Petersfield in Hampshire for gift parcels from New Zealand was exressed by General Sir George Jeffreys K.C.8., K.C.V.0., C.M.G., Member of Parliament for Petersfield at a short ceremony at the Commonwealth Gift Centre in Lowndes Square, 5.W.1., recently. Sir Harry Batterbee G.C.M.G., K.C.V.0., High Commissioner for the United Kingdom in New Zealand from 1939 to 1945 introduced General Sir George Jeffreys, and Mr F. P. Walsh,‘Chairman of the New Zealand Aid to Britain National Council, who replied. Mr Walsh in reply said that many people might wonder why New Zealanders felt so great a duty towards the welfare of the people of Britain. More than 98 per cent of the population of New Zealand was of British stock, and New Zealanders always referred to Britain as “the Old Country.” New Zealand was now supplying Britain with more than 30 per , cent of her meat supplies and more than 50 per cent of her butter and cheese requirements. The country’s total exportable surplus of meat and 97 per cent of the exportable surplus of butter and cheese was being sent to Britain, and the people of New Zealand were only too happy for this marketing arrangement to continue. It was hoped to increase New Zealand’s production considerably in the next five years. Mr Walsh is at present representing the New Zealand Government in negotiations with the British Government over the prices of meat and dairy products. He is a member of the Dairy Products Marketing Commission, and the Stabilisation Commission, vice-president of the New Zealand Federation of Labour, and president jof -the Wellington Trades Council.