PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :--
TIC.O. 885
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ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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With regard to combinations, I am one of those who do see serious danger to Imperial trade in the combination which has recently taken place. After all, the prime object with which your naval estimates are brought down, and upon which they are supported, is that of protecting the trade of the United Kingdom, and, the trade, of course, carried in British bottoms. If a largo portion of the trade ceases to be carried in British bottoms there is so much less for that argument to cover, and it might give a very large handle to those who wish to reduce the general protection to trade given by the Navy, and might seriously increase the difficulties of providing for Imperial defence, and also the difficulties of those who may assist to contribute towards imperial defence on the sca. Now, in that light, it strikes me that this is a combination which does present a danger which will increase pari passu with any extension of the area of combination. And it does present in that form, as no doubt it does in others, a very serious difficulty. How is it to be met? It is stated to be a matter of history that the Dutch supremacy on the seas was finally destroyed by the British navigation laws. That may be a matter of argument, but there are a great many who hold it to be true, and so far as I have read, find myself one of those who do believe it. Well, I am also one of those who think that if you are kicked on one side, it is not a fair thing to roll over and be kicked on the other; that it is time to get up, and I think that principle applies to the question of the navigation laws. Whether it would be possible with the concurrence of the whole of the self-governing portions of the Empire to make a general navigation law, accepting and asserting the principle, and leaving the application of it to the autonomous action of the Governments concerned, is a question which may well be considered, and I think this whole question of the navigation laws is one which may demand a larger and longer discussion than we have given to it yet. I am in doubt as to whether it would be the safest or the easiest thing to have one general Imperial navigation law for the Empire or, as I said, once asserting the principle to leave the application to the autonomous Governments and Parliaments concerned. I do think that the most practical suggestion that has yet been put forward for checking these combinations, which are themselves dangerous to every part of the Empire, is the proposal to revive the navigation laws in some form or
Canada has found, I believe, the enactment of such laws, placed as she is with regard to the United States, a practical necessity.
other.
Sir WILFRID LAURIER: Hear, hear.
Şir EDMUND BARTON : Whatever the opinions of the Government are about it at this stage, it only requires some extension of the area of such combinations to convince people who are not so close to the United States as Canada is, that similar aggression must be followed by similar defence. On that point then, if yon, Mr. Chamberlain, have'cvinced any sympathy with the suggestion to pass some navigation law to counteract this danger, feel that I share that sympathy.
As to the question whether the effect of a subsidy, and a liberal one, is to improve trade relations in the direction in which you wish them improved, I have very little doubt about that. You may have to divide the burden of subsidies between departments in the State. Your Post Office may object to have it all thrown upon itself and may say, let some other depart- ment share it. That is purely an internal arrangemont with which cach of the Empire can leave all the other parts to deal for themselves, but part
agree with Mr. Soddon that it is perfectly idle to suppose that a certain large subsidy given by a foreign State is designed merely to assist the carriage of mails. It is perfectly absurd to suppose that it is given on those grounds. In that instance, the more correspondence, so far, between the United States and New Zealand or Australia would not justify on commercial principles the application of so large a sum of money, but the prospective trade does justify it, and I am porfectly convinced that is the object of the subsidy, and the question is whether it is right for the other parts of the Empire to allow a network of that kind to encircle them or to do what lies in them to break the net by using whatever moans of defence are open to us, and I think that
when you are considering a position, which to some extent may affect the integrity of the Empire, the question whether a proposal is conformable to a particular fiscal system or not is one that must be lost sight of, on the same principle the question of the existence of a nation or an empire is more important than the incidents of its life.
Mr. FULLER: I would like to say a word or two. I was the manager of a mail steamship company in South Africa for 20 years, so I saw a good deal of freight business and opposition attempts to reduce rates, and the great difficulty is to secure, I think, not speed so much with a subsidised life as cheap freight to the various Colonies. Now, the German steamers go to Natal and charge a much cheaper freight rate for German goods, and then they arrange with the railways to have through bills of lading from the interior towns in Germany to tho interior towns in Africa and that arrangement carries everything before it, and what really is required is to securo cheap freights, to make any additional subsidy so to speak a rebate on freight if it can be arranged in that way, a reduction of freight or else a steamship company may tako a considerable sum of money and really do nothing in the direction indicated. What has happened in the South African trade, and I daresay in other places, is that there have been opposing lines in the interest of cheaper freight. Cheaper freights have been charged but before many months are over they have been, one after another during the 20 years I have known the trade, bought up by the original line, and so come into the ring, and so long as that is the case, the offers they make, and the services they perform, are of no permanent valute. But I think it most desirable that there should be very liberal subsidies. but in any such subsidies the cheaper freight, that is looking at it now from the freight, not the speed point of view, in connexion with the various leading railway lines, is the thing which is so requisite. How this is to be achieved, of course, is a very diflicuit mattor, It is a matter for discussion that we cannot go into here, but it is really the crux of the whole thing, to make the subsidies practically a rebate upon the freight. The mail lines in their contracts, I have negotiated several of them, so I know, havo refused to inako any pledges about freight whatever, but any subsidy should be on condition of reasonable freights, and should be associated with the railway lines of the country. It is in that way that Great Britain could, compete with the Germans.
Sir ALBERT IHME: I do not know enough about this coastal trade, Sir, to say much, but I presume this memorandum which has been placed before each of us was written some time ago, and there has not been time as yot to consider what has been the effect of the combines that have been made and the agreements that have been formed upon what is callel the coastal trade. That effect may be very much greater than is indicated in this particular document that is before us. To judge from this document the greater portion of the trado is carried on with the Colonies, with British possessions generally, by British ships, far and away the greater portion, something like per cent. I think I amn right in saying that in realing this over, something like 90 per cont. of the trade of the United Kingdom is carried on by Britishi ships and British shipping, but there is no doubt, I think, that these combines, do seriously throaton British trade, and if we can in any way counteract that, either by means of navigation laws or by moans of subsidies, I think it is most desirable that something should be done. As far as subsidios are con- cerned, I suppose each Colony subsidises its maila-the carriage of those mails. Of course, I know that the Cape subsidisos to a large extent. believe it is 1:0,0001. a year that the Cape pays to its mail steamers, and Natal and the interior Colonics get the benefit of that subsidy.
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Alr. FULLER: Yos, about that for the carriage of mails.
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Sir ALBERT HIME: For the carriage of mails, but anything that will tend to improve and facilitate and oxpedite communication between the Mother Country and the various Colonies of the Empire, will, I think, be an K. 3
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