CHEAP SUGAR.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 272, 10 August 1908, Page 7

CHEAP SUGAR.

THE BRITISH RESTRICTIONS REMOVED. MODIFIED CONVENTION. / FREE IMPORTS FROM ANYWHERE. (by telegraph—MESS ASSOCIATION—COriIIIOHT.) (Rec. August 9, 4.30 p.m.) ,■ London, August 8. An Order-iti-Council has been gazetted revoking tho orders which prohibit tho importation into the United Kingdom of sugar from Denmark, Russia, Argentina, and Spain. It will be possible, after September 1, to import sugar freely from any country. BOUNTY-FED SUGAR. This is in accord with the amendment which the present Liberal Government insisted on inserting ill the new Sugar Convention, viz.: that Britain should be exempted from the article compelling her to penalise bounty-fed sugar.' Many of the Freetraders would like to see the Convention torn up root and branch, and one of them, Mr. E. A. Villiers (Liberal member for Brighton) recently told Mr. Asquith that tho modified Convention was a betrayal of Freetrade principles. The Prime Minister replied that the new Convention was in harmony with all the essential principles of Freetrade; "it did not contain any restrictions as to the sourco froin which sugar could bo obtained." The effect is that Britain, in the interests of her manufacturers and consumers, is willing to take sugar from anywhero, as cheap as a bounty or any other artificial device can mako it.

'Mr. Villiers also crossed swords on this subject with Sir Edward Grey (Secretary for Foreign Affairs) in the House of Commons in June. He said that the effect of the Sugar Convention was that Great Britain had paid in the three years which followed tho Convention .£6,000,000 more for practically the same amount of sugar than she had paid in the three years immediately preceding the Convention. Tho present Government had renewed the Convention for five years, and in doing so had acted independently of Parliament. If the new Convention was the. same as the old it was protection. If it was different in any way Parliament should bo asked to ratify it. They wanted to bo assured that they were not in tho grip of foreign-financiers and European producers.

Sir Edward Grey pointed out that the Convention, having been agreed to some years ago by Great Britain, and the foreign countries having, at Great Britain's request, got rid of a complicated system of bounties, Great Britain was bound to discuss with those countries the question of the continuation of tho Convention. In doiug 'so sho made it clear that the penal clause must, as. far as she was concerned, be made non-effective. As a rpsult of conference a modified Convention was agreed to The danger of the penal clause was entirely gone. Great Britain could not bo asked to close her ports to anyone. The Government had secured freedom and liberty for the country, and so far from sacrificing the interests of the country he though the Government deserved some credit for having secured the liberty now enjoyed without any economic rupture with other countries.