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Lastly, the Conference recommended a system of pooling revenue, details of which would be worked out by the Board. The essential feature would be that the Commonwealth organizations would pay their net revenues from overseas telecommunications services into a Central Fund to be administered by the Board. From this Fund would be met the expenses of the Board and, in certain circumstances, a contribution to the upkeep of the cable system, which would continue to be owned and maintained by the United Kingdom. The main object to be secured by these measures was a unification both of Government policy and financial interests which would enable the telecommunication systems of the Commonwealth to be developed as a whole, using both cables and wireless to the best advantage and without the artificial routing of traffic to which a divergence of cable and wireless interests naturally tends. 10. The Commonwealth Telecommunications Conference was very conscious of the difficulties which the Commonwealth telecommunication organization will have to face in the next few years. They realized, however, that it would inevitably take a considerable time to establish the new organization throughout the Commonwealth, and, in order to provide for the interim period pending the introduction of the full scheme, they suggested that the Governments of the Commonwealth should enter into an agreement providing, firstly, that the scope of the Commonwealth Communications Council should be extended to cover the Dominion and Indian organizations as well as Cable and Wireless, Ltd.; secondly, that as many as possible of the responsibilities envisaged for the Commonwealth Telecommunications Board under the full scheme should be vested in the Commonwealth Communications Council, and in particular that the Governments should endeavour to secure that the communication organizations in their territories should comply with any approved recommendations of the Council on the matters described in paragraph 9 above, and should not enter into negotiations with foreign telecommunication interests on any major points except after consultation with and agreement of the Council; and, thirdly, that measures should be taken to enable the Governments of the countries concerned to acquire ownership of the telecommunication interests in the Dominions and India at present owned by Cable and Wireless, Ltd. PROPOSALS FOR THE FUTURE 11. The recommendations of the Commonwealth Telecommunications Conference have been accepted by all the Commonwealth Governments, and in the United Kingdom a Bill to bring the share capital of Cable and Wireless, Ltd., into public ownership was recently passed by the House of Commons, and is at present before the House of Lords.

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