Control of foreign borrowing is an example of a type of problem with which the Government is faced in the present unprecedented times. It we were at war, controls on the country's economic life would necessarily have to be more complete. But conditions today are so far from normal that the country needs some of the restraints which wartime controls would impose.
Imports are inevitably increased, and exports decreased, by the claims of rearmament.
The main avenue through which capital can flow abroad is effectively controlled by the Foreign Transactions Advisory Committee, and I believe the work of that body without the authority of statute behind it, using its influence merely because there is a high spirit of good understanding and good sense in the City, is widely approved by the business community.
But the private purchasers of foreign securities could if they were not restrained amount to a very considerable drain on our capital. It could be stopped, of course—it could be stopped completely—it we were to adopt here and now measures of inspection and control and registration—all of them very hampering and very undesirable if they can be avoided, and they are measures which for my part I should be very reluctant to impose unless the need were proved.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.