EMPIRE TRADE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 November 1940, Page 4

EMPIRE TRADE

BRITAIN’S WAR TIME POLICY. COMMENT BY PREMIER & MR NASH. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. The references to restrictions on Empire trade by the President of the Board of Trade, Captain Oliver Lyttelton, and by Lord Stamp, a member of the Economic Advisory Council (reported in a cablegram received yesterday), were discussed by the Prime Minister, Mr Fraser, in an interview last night. “The remarks of Lord Stamp and Captain Lyttelton,” he said, “completely support the attitude of the New Zealand Government in regard to non-es-sential imports, and wholly corroborate Mr Nash’s cententions as to the viewpoint and policy of the United Kingdom Government. Seldom ha’s it been the lot of any man in public and political life to have his line of argument and arguments substantiated to such a degree. He is proved to be 100 per cent right.” “This is the outcome of discussions that have been taking place for some time," said the Minister of Customs. Mr Nash, when tlie cabled message was referred to him. “Obviously it appears unfair to suggest that the people of the United Kingdom should be deprived of some of the manufactures of the United Kingdom in order to make them available to people in other parts of the Empire and Commonwealth,” said Mr

INcloll. llltj UIIIIUU iMiiguuni uuvvinment has now approved the principle of treating the Empire and the Commonwealth as a unit, and we all should be willing to go without non-essential goods so that the war effort can be developed to its maximum." The Minister added that this would not in any way prevent essential commodities from being obtained from the United Kingdom if possible, or, failing that, wherever they were available.