Complaints of lack of interest do not hold good in
respect of the series of trade agreements concluded or being concluded by the Government. Mr. Runciman had a rough passage on the agreement with Germany on Tuesday, when twenty or thirty Conservatives voted against him. Far fewer than that number, however, were moved by the assiduously propagated idea that Mr. Runciman is a Machiavellian Free Trader who must be destroyed. Most of the malcontents were probably in the position of Sir Austen Chamberlain, who was bound to oppose a reduction of tariffs affecting trades in his constituency. This sort of incident is, of course, innate in a tariff system, and the more tariffs are flexible the more often they will occur. Some sympathy is indeed per- missible with those who thought that tariffs were in- variable except upon a recommendation of the Import Duties Advisory Committee, and who now find that the Government claims overriding power to, alter tariffs if questions of policy are involved. But even they cannot pretend that they were not warned that tariffs would be used as bargaining instruments and that they did not cheer the sentiment when uttered.
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