China's Million Debt

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 402, 10 July 1928, Page 9

China's Million Debt

OWED TO BRITISH FIRMS RAILWAY ROLLING-STOCK British Official Wireless Reed. 11.35 a.m. RUGBY, Monday. In the House of Commons, the Foreign Secretary, Sir Austen Chamberlain, stated in answer to a efuestion that he had no information as to whether the retiring Chinese Northern troops carried off 6,000 goods wagons and 300 locomotives, being practically half of the rolling stock of the railway north of the Yangtse. Other facts stated in the same question were substantially correct, namely, that two British firms were owed over £1,000,000 for rolling stock, toward which nothing had been paid since 1922, and that large sums of money are also owed to British firms for railway material. Sir Austen Chamberlain added that constant efforts have been made by the British Minister in the past to secure payment of these debts by the Chinese authorities, but owing to the fact that the railways were the chief instruments of civil war it was impossible to expect any result until some form of unified control emerged. Nevertheless, the British Minister’s efforts to secure payment of these commercial debts would not be relaxed.