INVITATION ISSUE

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 73, 23 September 1930, Page 9

INVITATION ISSUE

AUSTRALIAN OVERDRAFTS

(By Telegraph.—Press Association.) CHBISTCHUBCH, 22nd Sept. When Sir Otto Nieineycr was asked to reply to the statement of Mr. A. Blakeley, Commonwealth Minister for Home Affairs, that Sir Otto, Niemeyer had not come to Australia, at the invitation of the Commonwealth Government, he declined to discuss the subject. He said it was not correct that the Bank of England had suggested to the Commonwealth Government that they should send a representative to Australia with a view to taking over the Australian Government's overdrafts at the Commonwealth Bank and the Westminster Bank, London. A bank reserve was not interested in suea business. ,

lii a speech Mr. Blakeley denied that Sir Otto Niemeyer went to Australia at the invitation of the Commonwealth Government. The fact was, he said, that the Bank of England suggested to the Government that it should send a representative to Australia with a view to taking over the overdraft of the Commonwealth Bank and the "Westminster Bank, London. Mr. Blakeley added that Labour had not and would not endorse Sir Otto Niemeycr's proposals to reduce the standard of living in Australia to that of England, with its two millions of unemployed. Mr. J. A. Beasley, Assistant Minister of Industries, made a similar declaration at Queanbeyan, and added: "Financial interests abroad do not desire that secondary industries in Australia should be developed. They desire that Australia should remain merely a Crown colony, producing raw materials for manufacturers abroad. Labour is certainly not going to allow that." ,