PLAIN LANGUAGE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 August 1941, Page 5

PLAIN LANGUAGE

USED BY MR ROOSEVELT NO MISUSE OF LEND OR LEASE FUNDS. DENUNCIATION OF “DIRTY FALSEHOOD.’’ (By Telegraph—-Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, August 26. President Roosevelt at a Press conference today said that charges which have been macle of misuse of Lend or Lease funds could be characterised as distorted half-truths or falsehoods spread to sabotage the programme for the defeat of Hitlerism. He dealt with two specific accusions. First, that British officials have charged their meals and drinks in Washington to the lend or lease fund, and, secondly, that American steel has been sent to England for war use while British firms are still doing business as usual in the shipment of steel fabricated articles to Argentina. Regarding the first, the President said he was most certain that no such thing had been done. The story was not worth the denial; it was just a plain, dirty falsehood. Referring to the second, he said that the British had some contracts negotiated in the nast which required a certain amount of steel, and the British firms did fulfil the contracts but under no interpretation could these shipments be considered American steel.