The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 7, Issue 5 (September 1, 1932)
Critic Answers Critic
Critic Answers Critic.
The range of the work done at the Ottawa Conference was no more and no less than reasonable people expected. Those English free-trade critics who say that too much has been done, and those foreign observers who say that next to nothing has been done, may be left to argue it out; their arguments cancel each other. The truth lies in between. Britain was, from the outset, determined that help given to Empire trade should not connote ruin to foreign trade; and as she (and we) need both, who will blame her? Certainly the Dominion delegates have not done so. They received, and gave, concessions. What they received was partly Customs preferences, partly “quota.” Value of the trade thus won can be proved only by experience. Continuous observation of working results will win new knowledge.