REGIONAL POLICIES
Regional and industrial policies
137. Because of the new opportunities for the economy as a whole, we shall be able as members of the Community to deal more effectively with our problems of regional development. All our experience over the years is that measures to stimulate such development work best within a wider framework of expanding trade and investment.
138. The Community recognise that regional policy has a vital and continuing role to play in economic development. Membership, therefore, will not inhibit the continuation and further development of vigorous regional policies which are necessary both on economic and social grounds. The existing members of the Community are pursuing such policies and they are using a wide range of regional assistance measures, many of which are similar to our own measures.
139. In the enlarged Community, we shall be sharing experience and exploring how the institutions of the Community can help us in dealing with the process of regional adaptation to major changes in industrial structure.
SPECIAL TARIFF ARRANGEMENTS
140. Duties on most industrial materials are zero in both the United Kingdom tariff and the CET of the Community, but there are a number of items of particular importance to British industry which are dutiable under the CET, and we have sought to ensure that our membership of the Community will not lead to a new charge on supplies of these materials.
141. In some cases, after a careful examination of the situation, it has been concluded that the enlarged Community will be self-sufficient. For the rest, we have agreed on arrangements which will ensure that about 90 per cent of our imports from outside the enlarged Community will continue to be imported free of duty. These arrangements will be particularly beneficial to Canada and Australia, who are important suppliers of several of the materials concerned. The agreements reached are summarised in Annex B.
142. In addition, the Community has agreed to continue indefinitely its suspension of the duty on tea.
THE FREE MOVEMENT OF LABOUR
143. Under the Community's regulations nationals of member countries may enter the territory of another member state to look for work or to take a job already arranged. In practice the provision for the free movement of nationals of the Six to seek or take up work has had only a limited effect on the actual movement of workers. The Community as a whole has been consistently short of labour and large numbers of workers from outside the Community have moved into it to take up unfilled jobs. Inside the Community movement of workers between member countries actually diminished between 1965 and 1969. The movement of labour within an enlarged Community will probably continue to be dominated by economic and social factors, rather than by regulations, and
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