IN THE COMMONS

Hokitika Guardian, 14 July 1932, Page 2

IN THE COMMONS

MR MACDONALD’S SPEECH

WAR DEBTS AND U.S A. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, July 12. Both floors of the galleries in the Commons were full when Mr MacDonald: made his statement on the proceedings at Lausanne. He was heartily cheered on rising, and many ot his points won him vigorous applause. He began by claiming that the conference and its results could lead to a settlement of those questions of reparations which lay somewhere about the root cf every ec'cncmic trouble that had overtaken the world since the war, which falsified national budgets, and placed in the centre of Europe, a country whose financial position was a menace to the whole world. While reparations lasted there could be no complete ..industry recovery. There had been many plans and . conferences to . deal with those economic lollies of reparations. As the result'.cf Lausanne, he hoped they had heard the last of them. Au initial difficulty ‘at the Conference . was that Germany, paid reparations, and reparations only, to France and Britain. The others pa'iid and also received War debts. America received debts in each of those three groups, and quite properly refused to treat its contractual obligations so as to mix it'se’.f up with the position of any of the others. Chancellor Von Papen stoutly declined throughout to admit that war debts were any affair of his, while Washington said it could not consider war debts - from the viewpoint of its debtors, who were recipients of •. Preparations.''' Fortunately the gist of the speeches, and other expressions of American public opinion amounted to this:, “Let Europe decide oil the best practical settlement for itself. Let it publish its views and we * shall consider reaso'hably what is the part which America in equity can play.” Much has been written about a 'Gentlemen’s Agreement,)’ said Mr MacDonald. Apparently that arose out of the reply he made at last Friday’s plenary session to a question put to him by the German Chancellor as to whether if their plan failed, the Germans would be guaranteed that a conference would follow. He replied that it certainly would. Instead of allowing Germany to fall back on the Young Plan,' they agreed they would, in such event,j. fake u,p.

the matter again, and see if some other method were' Available! ' They

were, ' however, convinced ‘ that \t)heir plan’would not fall through. The sub-' stance of the ‘Gentlemen's "Agreement’ had been publicly announced on Frirdray.',p'+ \Vit’,' n ths- ’British' “delegates would have been in a difficult position when the Italian; .and French representatives had said i .“You Will get your agreement, if you now excuse ug all our debts.” The'British delegation replied: “You must wait and see,” the British Government whs not out to make any,-, profit on any- , thing it receives from reparations, and ■war debts, and that rule will hold. The Premier continued: “In dealing with this. - matter with America, we are touching a very tender spot. No one has the right to blame America for taking up her attitude. Had we all g t together, our work would- be simplified, but America felt she had to be consistent, and I for one, although/America never uttered a pledge nor in any way indicated how far the was prepared to meet us, believe there is no nation in the world more ready to lend a' hand in straightening out the entanglements and troubles with which we are now surrounded than America, and her people. In view of the grievous results likely to fellow upon ary suggestion that Europe had -combined simply to j present something in the nature of an ultimatum to the U.S.A. I wish to make it perfectly clear that all Lausanne did was to straighten out the internal difficulties of Europe, and agree on proposals which , the nations there represented believed to he essential-.” .

They had not agreed, he said, merely to, another scaling down in reparations, Britain wanted cancellation all round of reparations, .war debts, etc. That could not be obtained, but they got the delegates to agree to one capital and. final payment. Three milliards Reichsmarks were to be paid to the Bank of International Settlei ments by 'the German Government, and kept in trusteeship. After many arguments, they had isettled on three years complete moratorium, and devised means whereby the Bank of International Settlements should themselves decide when th'e bonds veie to be put on the market. By ending reparations, industry had been given' a chance of recovery. “You have never received a reparation payment yet,” he said, “but yon have paid more away for it than you got. The shrinkage in two years in exports of the four chief trading nations was ten times as great as the maximum annuity due last year. < Preparatory work for the second phase of the Conference was already begun by .the League of Nations, he added. The United States lias expressed willingness to - attend the woild economic conference. He himself, was not in favour of holding it at Geneva. Concluding, the Premier said that Europe had still to dissipate the surviving atmosphere of war. Germany must be brought back into ordinary national relationship. He wrs glad to say that Lausanne had brought Britain nearer to France, France ncaior to Germany, and France and Germany nearer..to Britain. They must try to get their difficulties removed by applying the increasing spirit of the League Covenant. The British GovS * .

ernment would continue to use its good offices for peace. The work had only begun. Disarmament opened new ways, and they might be very broad ways.

The Opposition Leader £Mr Lansbury) promised full support to the Lausanne agreement, and to any further proposals which had the object of solving the world’s economic problem.

•Mr Churchill added that he was unable to join in the general rejoicing over the Lausanne Treaty. Anything removing friction between Germany and France was good, but Germany ought above all, to be felicitated. Within fifteen years of the war, she was virtually free from tlie burden of repairing the awful injuries inflicted on- her neighbours.

MR L. GEORGE’S FIERCE ATTACK

LONDON, July 12,

In the Commons, Mr MacDonald spoke for fifty-five minutes. He was often, listless and sometimes almost incoherent, and was obviously affected in health. Nevertheless, the attempt to reply to Mr Churchill’s charges about secret understandings did not impress the House, which felt that Mr MacDonald had failed to clear what “The Times” describes as “the air of mystery about the socalled 'gentlemen’s agreement.’ ” In contrast with the opening ovation, only a murmur of approval greeteu Mr MacDonald’s conclusion.

Mr LaUsbury, Mr Lloyd George, and Mr Chamberlain followed. Mf Lloyd George spoke for nearly two hours. . The Government benches frequently and angrily accused him. of mischief-making, which he resented, saying, “My service to England has been as patriotic a.s anybody’s.”

Nevertheless, the Government' tooii such a serious view of his utterances and the probable effect in America, that Mr Chamberlain rose immediately, instead of later to enable a reassuring of America.

the “Gentlemen’s agree- ■ MENT.”

RIGHT TO KNOW THE CONTENTS

. LONDON, July 12. Speaking in the House of- Commons Mr Lloyd Gleoirgc,, referring to the Lausanne Conference'' negotiations, urged that the British Parliament had the right to know the contents of the so-called “Gentleman’s Agreement,” that was 'entered into on July 9, which M. Herriot had disclosed to France. He asked did Chancellor Von Papen know whefi he signed at Lausanne that another Agreement had been entered, into which rendered the vvho’e thing nugatory. If the terms of this “gentleman’s agreement” were given : to Captain Von Papen,-then he had withheld it from the German public.

Referring to America, Mr Lloyd George said: “If you ail® going 't6 negotiate with a creditor, the worst thing is to make him angry. I have never suggested repudiation. If America infests, Britain must stand by bier bond.” This remark evoked cheers.

Regarding the general .situation, said Air Lloyd George, the Government had claimed that it had balanced the budget and had restored general confidence, but it had not touched the root of the evil. British commerce had fallen fiat during 1931. Steps must yet be taken to build up conditions under which British commerce would be able to recover. At the time of the general election, he recalled, the British sovereign was worth twenty shillings. Now the Government was taking special measures to keep it at fifteen shillings! So*, much for the wisdom of the pundits and the penguins! He, Air Lloyd George, did - not expect much from the Ottawa Conference, hut considered thte preferential tariffis would be infinitely better than quotas. He added: “Let us do something for ourselves, 'instead of standing for ever at the doors of foreign offices and of conferences waiting for something to turn up.” AVhen Air Churchill supported Air Lloyd in insisting that the agreement be published, Air Ramsay MacDonald became obviously perturbed. He shook his head and then, he whispered to Mr Neville Chamberlain, who at once rose. Hie. spoke trenchantly. Hie said: “Did Air Lloyd George suggest that we sihoud agree to cancellation all round, irrespective of what will happen with America afterwards? It might be that, when we went to America, we would say that we had done what we. were asked to do, and had agreed, among ourselves that, if she still felt she must ask us to pay something more than we receive from our allies, then we must consider what we were going to do.”

Mr Chamberlain said that there wais no mystery about the arrangement that had been made in Britain with France and Italy. There was not the slightest objection to publishing the papers if thtei other Governments would allow it.

Mr MacDonald, intervening, said that the 'gist of the documents was on public record, so that there was no occasion to publish them. Mr CTurchr'l: While those documents are withheld, difficulties and suspicions will arise. 'Sir John S'mon (Foreign Secretary) replying to the debate said that an effort had been made at Lausanne in true comradeship to turn the gaze of Europe to the future and to turn their backs on ( the, past. President Hoover bad made a vail liable contribution in the matter of disarmament, hut it had niaver been suggested that lib proposal was a cast iron one, and that everyone mmst bow down and worship it. Britain was after internaitional disarmament, but a proper

regard must be 1 'given to reductions that Britain had already made singlehanded. The debate was then adjourned. Mr N. Chamberlain’s explanation seemed to satisfy the House of Commons. . ij-ri.