BRITISH AND COLONIAL TRADE.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1585, 19 March 1879, Page 4

BRITISH AND COLONIAL TRADE.

By the laßt mail (says the " New Zealand Times") arrived a circular from the Canadian | Dominion Board of Trade, urging that various British and Colonial Chambers of Commerce should take action in endeavoring to draw closer the trade relations between Great Britain and her dependencies. The circular found its way to the Chamber of Commerce, but as it was addressed to the "Board of Trade" it was thought to come more within the province of a Government department, and was therefore forwarded to the Colonial Secretary. He, however, returned it to the local Chamber of Commerce. It is desired to convoke a convention of representatives of the various Chambers of Commerce, to be held in London during 1879, and the object of the convention is explained by one or two extracts. The first is an extract irom the report of the Canadian delegate wM> attended a meeting of the Associated Chambers of Commerce of the United Kingdom, held in London in February, 1877. He remarked the abeenee of any reference to the colonies in the resolutions passed by that body regarding treaties, and reported having successfully drawn attention to the necessity of the colonies' existence being recognised; but ho adds that much tangible good would arise from a convention at which colonial commerce could make its voice heard. He then proceeds :-" Such an assemblage might be convened at the same time as that adopted for the annual meeting in London of the association, and the colonial delegates might have a representative status at its meetings. It is, of course, an important question, whether it would be wise to adopt a retaliatory policy towards the United States, or any other country whose present fiscal policy is so antagonistic, either to Great Britain or her colonies; but I do think that all lovers of our present connection with the mother country should exert every effort to draw the component parts of the British Empire together, in so far as thought and action may contribute to consolidation. This, to my mind, can be better accomplished by establishing freer commercial intercourse between the colonies themselves, and between them and the United Kingdom, the result of such action being the building up of a great trade Empire, with which foreign countries would be only too glad to join. In this way, free trade principles would be nursed and protected. I firmly believo that, unless some broad scheme of this kind is planned and given effect to, the commercial prosperity of Great Britain will be undermined by foreign countries, demoralising separate portions of the colonial Empire in detail, and inflicting suffering such as Canada has experienced during the paet three years." The ciroular next sets out a resolution of the Dominion Board favorable to the idea, and proceeds to state that the proposal has been well received by leading political economists of Great Britain.