Mr. GRAHAM:

No, it is, true that there was a difference of opinion in the trade itself, but I should think that for the trades it would be better to give the one definite date, because business men always argue that while they can fight obstacles of all kinds the one thing which they cannot fight is uncertainty, and if the duties were continued for three years, with the possibility of a change of Government that would have exposed important sections of British industry to uncertainty as to the continuance or otherwise of the duties in question, and so the Government decided to repeal the duties all at once. The other point which remains is the larger question of the duties themselves and their aspect upon unemployment. Our information up to the present is that the expected repeal of those duties—they have not yet disappeared—has had no appreciable effect upon unemployment at all.

There is a certain temporary embarrassment—at least we hope that it is temporary—in certain parts of the country, but I think that these are only examples, which may be localised, and I can only add that the Government is bound to take its position on all the facts believing as it does that a Free Trade policy is better for this country than a policy which, whatever the origin of the duties was, had at all events become Protection, because during the whole course of the Debate on the general question recently no one suggested that the peculiar conditions which obtained during the War remained still in force. That those conditions had disappeared was generally admitted, and with the disappearance of those conditions there had gone the 1915 case for the duties. I am not a slave to any particular economic doctrine one way or another, but I have always felt that, on balance, a policy of fiscal freedom is the better policy for this country, and there are many reasons on which this could be argued, if this were the appropriate time. My own faith is that the individuality of the British worker and the ability of manufacturers in this country and the quality of the British goods produced by those who are engaged in the industry, will tide over any temporary dislocation, and, taking a long view, that the trade will be stronger and better rather than weaker as a result of the change.