He TUESDAY, AUGUST 10,' 1909. BRITAIN AND THE PESSIMISTS, _4_—:—

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 582, 10 August 1909, Page 4

The Dominion TUESDAY, AUGUST 10, 1909. BRITAIN AND THE PESSIMISTS.

The readiness with which a certain class of , colonial politicians and some newspapers seize on every adverse circumstance to point to the decadence of England's trade has been remarked on before in these columns. A decline in exports or impprts is made the text of /angry or patronising protests against the methods of' British manufacturers as compared •ivith those of other countries, or is used to point some moral which may or .may not be well-meant, but oei;tainly is derogatory. to the Mother Country.' As recently 1 as last week we had a Minister of the Crown in New Zealand harping on this question. - We do not suggest that the ■remarks of the Hon. T. Mackenzie referred to were uttered in an unfriendly spirit, but they were typical of a certain class of comment, and, to a'large extent, quite misleading comment. Mr. Mackenzie, addressing the Agricultural Conference on the question of the Dominion's export trade, said: '.'There was no doubt about the loss of [Britain's] purchasing power, and it must be patent to all that Britain was losing her grip on the world's trade. . . . Her rivals had taken, the trade from Britain, and were now disputing the supremacy of tho sea." ■ This very pessimistic and quite unwarranted view of the situation comes with a particularly bad grace just now from Me. Mackenzie, when his political chief in England is saying exactly the reverse so far as. the question of Britain's decadence is concerned. It may interest our readers to learn something of the relation of Britain's trade to . that of 'her great commercial rivals, Germany and America. The figures; which we give below are taken from the Statesman's Tear Book, and are particularly interesting as showing that the depression in trade has not been confined to Britain ,alone. In working out the totals we have allowed 20 marks to £l for Germany and 5 dollars to £l for the United States. 1 ■.

Total Trade—lmports 'And Exports.' , United Britain. Germany/ - States. . Year. £ - • £ ' £ ■ 1905 ... 972,616,444 603,904,000 521,851,542 1906 :... 1,068,566,3H 745,858,050 588,703,165 1907 1,163,785,109 805,195,300 657,627,891 1908 . 1,050,025,871 ' 775,000,000 605,825,629 Britain's outstanding, supremacy can bo seen from these figures.- Her rivals, it will be noted, have suffered a drop in trade, during 1908 as well as Britain herself.' But it should be borne in mind that in addition to her ordinary trade Britain is the;largest money-lender of the ,world.' To the enormous income represented by her exports .must 'be' the even more l striking sum derived from her investments abroad. The income from these investments has;been estimated at annually, a sum which completely ■- eclipses tho' foroign investments of any other, country in the world—probably/the whole of them combined. Possibly, however, -the most convincing table of all concerning the trade rivalry between Germany and Britain is that wliich shows the imports of each of these coun-' tries from'one another;' We are continually having .jfc thrust i?n ,us that; German methods are 'far: ahead;of-British trade and that Germany is each year squeezing more of its products into the British market, to the sad detriment of British' ( goods. What are" 'the - actual facts 1 Our figures only carry us to 1907, but they are very convincing: Exports Imports from from U.K. Germany into U.K. into Germany. £ .£ 1903; ... ... 3-1,533,390 . , 23,550.631 190-1 , ... !■■ ... ■ 33,944,322. • . - •' 25,1031270 1905 , ' ... 35,709,758 - ■ . .29,704,449 1906 " ... ... 38,021,762 33,558,954 1907. ': ... ■.... 38,782,062-- -- . 41,359,840 It will be seen from the above figures that the, exports from Britain to Germany, have gradually caught .up and, over-top-ped the imports, from Germany. Had colonial and foreign produce re-exported to Germany from the United Kingdom been included in the above figures, the total for 1907 would have been £56,729,988, as 'against imports'-.from Germany totalling £38,782,062.: But, it may be asked, what are the commodities ? Where manufacturing industries are concerned, German methods are ahead of those in Britain. Very well, let the articles speak for themselves: Imported Exported to '- ' ' ' . from Germany. Germany. „ JS £ Sngar ... ■ ... " ... 11,693,907 - Glass and manuf; ... 912,166 — Eggs . 1,030,190 , — Cottons and yarn ... 2,037,375 8,553,071 Woollens and yarn ... 1,467,821 5,415,051 Iron and steel and i manufactures ...''439,630' ' Machinery . .„ .... -905,789 , 2,365,893 Wool, ana manuf. ... 1,964,465 . —' Alpaca, etc., yarn i.. — 1,859,313 Wool ... _ ... • 1.. ; — 1.905,041 Coal, coke, etc. ... . — ■ 5,460,107 Herrings /... ... >; 2,326,258 Ironwork ... 2,833,901 New ships, etc. — 1,260,851 These are the principal articles of trade between the two countries, and our readers can judge for themselves how far Britain has been holding her own. We do not pretend' to argue that all is as well with the Mother Country just now as onecould wish. But the same remark applies with equal force to New Zealand. No one in this country doubts that with'proper management and a; restoration of .public confidence matters in New Zealand will right themselves, but, ciyiously enough, it seems to be a growing tendency to view the outlook in Britain with quite needless despondency.