RADIO IN CANADA

New Zealand Listener, Volume 15, Issue 384, 1 November 1946, Page 13

RADIO IN CANADA

ROM time to time the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has felt very much the need of reaching the listening public direct through a journal of its own, as is done by the publiely-owned radio systems of Great Britain, New Zealand, end Australia. But so far no journal has been established. The CBC has met the demand of listeners to read important talks and discussions, after broadcast, by the issue of booklets, sold to listeners at a. price sufficient to cover the cost.

This information was given to us in an interview with Paul V. McLane, the

newly-appointed commercial secretary to the Canadian High Commissioner in New Zealand. Mr. cLane’s work is mostly concerned with trade between New Zealand and Canada. He told us that in the few months he has spent in New Zealand so far, he has acquired a great liking for our ctayfish. So we, in turn, asked him if he could say how long it would be before our grocer could give satisfaction when we asked him for a tin of Canadian salmon. He was not optimistic. "You see," he said, "the salmon catch this year started poorly, and we have had no reports yet about the quantity of the final catch. During the war all the tinned salmon was allocated to the Combined Food Board and New Zealand’s share was determined by the London Food Council." On the basis of food needs, he said, most of the salmon had gone to the United Kingdom; only a small percentage was left even for the Canadians themselves. Talking generally about trade, Mr. McLane said that the Canadians were keenly aware that trade to-day was not operated on a one-way street system. Canada would try to help her former customers to rehabilitate themselves through loans and other means. New Zealand, like Canada, was dependent to a large extent on external trade, and Canada hoped to increase her purchases from New Zealand. In 1928 Mr. McLane joined the Canadian Department of Trade and Commerce, and was posted to Kobe, Japan, early the next year, as assistant Trade Commissioner. He stayed there

till 1939, becoming Trade Commissioner, and then went to Hong Kong. With 3,000 British civilians, 500 Americans and 80 Canadians he was interned by the Japanese in a prison camp at Stanley on the island of Hong Kong. After a starvation diet for six months he was repatriated. Mrs. McLane had been interned in Manila, but met her husband again at Lourenco Marques, and they returned to Canada together. Foreign service still appealed to him, so he asked for and received the appointment in New Zealand.