FREER TRADE SOUGHT

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 770, 17 September 1929, Page 9

FREER TRADE SOUGHT

NO TARIFF INCREASES FOR TWO YEARS BRITISH MINISTER’S PLAN Britis7i Official Wireless RUGBY, Monday. The President of the Board ot Trade, Mr. William Graham. In an address at Oxford, said the delegates to the Economic Conference of 1927 had definitely recommended free trade and a progressive reduction of tariff barriers. However, for various reasons, the intervening two years had not been productive of results. At this stage in economics a United States of Europe probably was mainly an ideal but there might be much practical progress if European countries and others agreed, for two years at least, not to raise their existing tariffs and bent, their energies to such an examination of the problem as might bring a reduct ion, either in specific commodities or in groups of commodities, in the near future. Side by side with such an inquiry ran proposals to secure an international agreement on hours, wages and working conditions in industries like the coal, iron and steel trades. Europe appreciated the fact that it would be better to organise a service of markets in terms of industrial efficiency and common fair play. That would he materially assisted by making the best use of the existing resources within the individual countries.