TRADE EXPANSION

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 164, 29 July 1937, Page 5

TRADE EXPANSION

-Presa Aasooiation.)

A Step in the Direction of Peace MR SAVAGE'S SURVEY

(By Telegraph-

WELLINGTON, This Day. "I do not see that there is any cause to be hysterical, but the position is far from being easy," said the Prime Minister, the Rt, Hon. M. J. Savage, to-day when qiiestioned about his _impressions of the international situation. "People generally look upon Great Britain as the greatest single factor in the preservation of peace; that is appreciated evreywhere. When you are brought face to face yvithi problems you find they are not the simple things they appear to have been." He found that there was general agreement that expansion of trade was a step in the direction of peace. People do not' wai!t to go to war, he said. Greater attention should be given m the future to trade expansion. Remarking on the striking evidences he had seen of the development of Britain' s air services, Mr Savage said that if anyone thought Britain was standing still jn this respect he had some more thinking to do. Great Britain was not standing still. Mr Savage said he sought a frank opinion of tne British authorities on the question of defence as to how the Hommion's policy should be regulated and fit into the Imperial scheme. When the Niew Zealand Government had all the evidence it requixed it would discuss the question of making the neeessary ehanges. He had told the First Sea Lord that if we had to defend New Zealand alone we could not develop sufficient strength to pull a herring oit a gridiron. New Zealand wanted information about the relationship of various branches of the service. He had made it known that New Zealand was concerned about the part the Navy would play, and the reply he received was that the circumstances would have to decide what would be the best thing to do, but it was commonsense to suppose that the two cruisers on the New Zealand station would remain in their place in New Zealand waters. All that the British authorities asked was the co-operation of the British Dominions in a common scheme of defence. Mr Savage said that the air was tho coming thing, but everyone realiscd that the Navy was just as necessary to-day as ever; in fact, it was more necessary. The New Zealand Government had a committee working along the line of the committee of Imperial defence at Home. Regarding the Singapore base, Mr Savago said that no-one could say precisely what would happen in a war involving east and west, but there was no doubt that those in eontrol at Home realised that the base must play a big part in the defence of the British Commonwealth.