I should like to digress from the trend of the Debate to say a few words concerning the Empire as there are so few occasions on which a private Member can draw attention to this particular subject. The question as I approach it may not prove so exhilarating as that of herrings in Scotland, but I hope that hon. Members will agree that it is quite as important. As is well known, the Empire Marketing Board was the direct outcome of a promise that was made to the Dominions not very long ago; it was, in fact, a quid pro quo for certain tariff preferences. The time has now come when we should seriously consider the broadening of the scope of the Empire Marketing Board. At the present time its activities are confined to stimulating the marketing and purchase of certain Empire goods in this country; but neither the Empire Marketing Board nor any other organisation, to the best of my knowledge, makes any attempt to place English goods into Empire markets.

I would suggest that there is only one barrier in the way of broadening the scope of the Empire Marketing Board, and that is that many of our manufacturers give the powers that be no encouragement to do so. I should like to give one or two examples of what I mean. What would be the use of spending immense sums of money advertising English motor cars within the Empire when our own English manufacturers refuse to instigate a proper policy of their own—when they persist in sending out motor-cars that, on the whole, are unsuitable to the conditions that are to be found overseas. Either the chassis clearances are too low, or the horse power, in many instances, is too small, or spare parts are not readily available in the various parts of the Dominions. I could give innumerable other exampples in various parts of the Empire. I will take the House, for instance, as far as the Solomon Islands. There, the homely razor is in great demand, but the British manufacturers are only prepared to supply a standard size of razor. The Solomon Islanders, for peculiar reasons best known to themselves, do not require a standard size of razor but an outsize in razor. Unfortunately, the British manufacturers not being prepared to provide them, the French, I am led to understand, have stepped in and are now supplying the islanders with that particular form of outsize razor that they demand. As the Solomon Islanders know nothing of the nimble art of honing and stropping, one can well believe that the number of razors that are required per native per year is not insignificant. In fact, the trade in the South Seas as a whole is a considerable one.

An American commercial traveller told me recently, when I was in Australia, that the only sphere in which the Americans now find difficulty in competing with the English is in the liquor trade in the United States of America itelf. That, undoubtedly, is somewhat of an exaggeration, but the fact remains that we are very slow these days in comparison with other countries in adapting ourselves to overseas conditions. Our industries themselves should show sufficient initiative to overcome this sort of thing. I am inclined to believe that what with export credits, various forms of subsidies and the like, many industries are now content to rely too much upon spoon feeding of successive Governments. If it were not for the unemployed that are concerned, I would welcome in certain specific directions the recent period of depression, brought about to some extent, in particular instances that I have in mind, by the manufacturers themselves failing to move with the times and to introduce modern machinery, in fact by generally allowing initiative to become sterile.

From studying this question—I might even say on the spot, because I recently had an opportunity of taking a comprehensive tour round our Empire—I know that there are markets within the Empire waiting for many of our products. Therefore, I would suggest that for the benefit of those go-ahead, wide-awake industries that are prepared to take advantage of it, that the Government should at the first opportunity—they may not get an opportunity before the election, but I am certain that they will get another opportunity before the year is out—promote a permanent representative committee for Empire trade and development; or, failing that, that they should, alternatively, widen the scope of the Empire Marketing Board. In other words, the Empire Marketing Board should work both ways, as its name leads one to understand; that it should advertise English goods within the Empire and instigate extensive research which will enable our industries to know with more certainty where they can place their products within the Empire, and exactly the class of goods that are required.