The Daily News. THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1922. TRADING WITH BRITAIN.
It can assuredly be claimed there is no subject which should be regarded by the business men, the producers and the- whole community of the Dominions as being of the first importance as that of trading with Britain. The reasons for so doing are so convincing that, apart from patriotism and sentiment, they are logically irrefutable. Britishers can only live whilst they export manufactured goods, and the producers of the Dominions can only live and prosper if the people of Britain can afford to purchase our preduee. It is necessary to remember that Britain founded the Dominions, developed them, gave them their freedom, and it is to her that the Dominions look for protection in times of trouble. Where would they have been during the war but for Britain’s purchase of their produce and her safe convoy thereof to its destination? What would be the position now if the British markets were dosed to the producers of the Dominions? What other country would bu.v our butter, cheese, meat, the bulk of our wool and | other exports, and give these commodities a free entry? Is it. right, or just that this dependence on Britain should be one-sided; that we should expect her to buy our goods and spend the value received by purchasing our requirements from other countries which confer no benefits in return, but, as in the ease of America, raise a tariff wall that shuts out our goods from America, and at the same time endeavors to strangle Britain’s shipping trade? There is another aspect of this question which also needs to be thoroughly comprehended, namely, that unemployment in Britain adversely affects the demand for the prices of the produce of the Dominions. That unemployment is in a large measure due to Britain having loaded herself with a colossal burden of debt and taxation to protect her trade and that of the Empire. By the Dominions purchasing their requirements in Britain they not only help to lessen unemployment, but to create a larger buying power for goods the Dominions have to sell. Take, for instance, fencing wire. According to a circular issued by the Joint Industrial Council for the iron and steel manufacturing industry of Great Britain:
“It is estimated that the production of a ton of common wire gives employment for a week to men in the wire mill, half a man in the steel works, one man in the colliery, and half a man in the rolling mil), .so that three and a half men engaged in several classes of labor lose work by the purchase of even a single ton of foreign wire.”
Taking each family as consisting of the two parents and two children, each ton of English wire used finds subsistence for fourteen of our kindred. In normal tynes New Zealand needs between 20 and 30 thousand tons of wir,e annually, of which 40 to 50 per cent, has been imported from America. If the importation reached 25,000 tons, of which 40 per cent, were American, the quantity would be 10,000 tons, so that by' placing these orders with America it is taking away employment from Britishers, and the means of subsistence from 140,000 of their dependents. The suicidal nature of such a policy is too obvious to need stressing, and it is necessary for the farmers of the Dominion to note well the effect of buying American wire, and the advantages accruing to them from insisting on demanding British manufactured goods, for the greater the prosperity in Britain the more largely will the farmer's of the Dominion benefit. As the Americans
will not have our produce, why should we purchase their goods, and send eleven millions sterling out of the Empire, as was the ease in 1920 ? It is much too soon yet to forget the pre-war custom of freely buying German goods, thus helping that country to build up her war machine, from the effects of which the Empire and the world in general will have to suffer for many years. No one desires to hamper or restrict either German or American trade, but it is claimed they should follow Britain’s example and develop countries that need it—Russia, for example. To some extent the people of the Dominions are in the hands of the traders, who may possibly be influenced by the higher profits they can make on foreign goods as,compared with British. Hence the necessity for demanding British goods, for even if the price may be slightly higher, the difference in value is more than compensated for by the higher quality of the British manufactures. When calling- for tenders recently, the ‘ Auckland Harbor Board specified that, goods should be British. That is the feeling and policy which should permeate the whole of the people in the Dominion. Britain is not only entitled to our trade, but has a prior claim over all others. There are many other cogent reasons which could with advantage be urged in support of the principle of trading with Britain and the other units of the Empire, but there should be no need for further emphasising the points mentioned above. It is the only sane arid sound policy that is possible if the Empire is to progress and grow in strength. Moreover, above all, it is “playing the game.”
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Taranaki Daily News, 27 July 1922, Page 4
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892The Daily News. THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1922. TRADING WITH BRITAIN. Taranaki Daily News, 27 July 1922, Page 4
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