FREE TRADE POLICY.

Taranaki Daily News, 30 March 1921, Page 2

FREE TRADE POLICY.

(To the Editor.) Sir.— l hear and see from papers a good deal of misguiding talk about, “Trade Within the Empire,” "Tariff Reform,” and British goqds for British People.” The face instinct of the British heart is appealed to, but not the practical Instinct of the British brain. One of my neighbors tells' me that if we get Free Trade in New Zealand the Dominion would become nothing more than a large cattle run. Now, in answer to this absurd idea let me say I have lately been reading from a learned American writer that according to the population and the development of the country, manufactory and commerce were far more robust and progressive under free trade than they have ever been since In America under protection. Let me give you a. paragraph from Mr. E._ Pulsford's book, “Commerce and the The beneficent part which the British system of free commerce has played in the development of the world at large during the past half century must not be forgotten. This historian who gives the world a faithful, history of the nineteenth century will tave to record how great a part has been played by the nation which had the sense to see that commerce z was a thing to be welcomed, not to be driven away. power of a great open market has brought Industry to many parts of the world, and thenfe is 'not a nation, big or little, that during the past fifty years has not increased' in wealth because® of the open ports of the United Kingdom: The world’s great customer has been, and is, the United Kingdom. Strange to say, there are people who apply the statistical measuring stick to the figures of population, wealth, etc., and., comparing tho results in various countries are quite ready to declare that countries grow in prosperity under a restrictive system quite as fast, or faster, than countries under a free system, and that, therefore, the free system has nothing io recommend it. In truth, this comparison of the statistics of free trade and restrictjonlst countries, which is so frequently being made, has in it an element of absurdity. Take the United States and the United Kingdom. There is probably not one American living under the Stars and Stripes who will not readily admit that his country had reaped very great benefit from the free admission into British ports which it, has possessed for its surplus produce, and, on the other hand, it is impossible to conceive of any American arguing that the United Kingdom was helped in any way towards prosperity by the action of the United States' tariff. There can be no disputing the truth o? these propositions. What then follows? It Us as clear as any deduction in logic can be: (1) that tie United States owes part of its great prosperity to British Policy; and (2) that the United Kingdom would have been far more prosperous had American policy not checked its commerce. Consequently it must of necessity be admitted that the 1 fiscal policies of the two countries cannot be judged by their respective statistics. The United Kingdom has been assisting to build up American Industry, and hence even in American statistics there is testimony to the stimulating power of the British free trade policy. So far as British policy has benefited the world at large, the benefits of that policy are to be reckoned plus tlie benefits outside Great Britain. The investment of British capital ‘n new lands ‘has been the means of building up new communities, whose wants mean additional commerce to the world at large, and the shipping of other countries tobday finds a scope for employment which could not have been found but for British enterprise, capital, and policy. There is no doubt of the important part which has been played by the United Kingdom in the world’s general development during the past fifty years; it is a part of which the whole Empire may well be proud. Is the Empire now, in the twentieth l century, to play a less noble part? Is she to cast aside the great policy which has done so much to promote the welfare of the world so much to increase the happiness of millions? It is reasonable for Britons all the world over to nsk themselves whether in being “Mistress of the Seas” there is not involved some moral obligation to sustain the principle of freedom of commerce. It would be a mean sort of thing for this Empire of ours, embracing, as it does, so much of the world’s best and most productive lands (and especially now we are taking over the German colonies), to enter upon a purely selfish dog-in-the-manger policy, after making the Empire so valuable to the rest of the world. To seriously alter British commercial policy would cause world wide trouble. There seems something of the ludicrous in the idea Af tampering with tho policy of the “open doer” at home and fighting for it abroad. The the faith of the United Kingdom in freedom’s cause is still yi living force, and it will shine all the brighter when the saving grace of common sense has swept the cobwebs' away. It will be clearer than ever that a prosperous outer world is a good thing for the Empire. —I am etc., R. BIERGON. Normanby March 22, 1921.