Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that Commonwealth trade has increased since 1951 by £3,000 million, but that this country has been able to secure only £100 million of that? Is not this a deplorable development? Does not the right hon. Gentleman know that our share of trade with Commonwealth countries has been reduced from 25 per cent. to 19 per cent. and that this trade with the Commonwealth has been lost to Germany, Japan and France? Is not it time that we had something more effective to build up this trade?

Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that since we were alarmed by his speech last Friday, showing the current trend in British exports, his statement today, coming as it does almost in the last week of a dying Parliament, has all the signs of window-dressing just before an election? Why was the statement not made three years, or even three months, ago?