Mr. R. J. Boothby, who is Private Parliamentary Secretary to
the Chancellor of the Exchequer, made an important speech to his constituents at Peterhead on Friday, December 14th, explaining his own views about British relations with Russia—a subject of the greatest importance to the East Coast fishing trades. We agree with him that there is " nothing more unlikely " than the expulsion of Stalin and Co. from the seats of the mighty, for, as he said, the present Administration in Moscow has supreme military and economic power. He stated very fairly the Government's case ; the bar to official relations being, on the one hand, the danger that the Soviet Government might . again use diplomatic facilities for propaganda, and on the other hand the obstinate refusal of the new Russia to recognize the Tsarist foreign debts. He suggested two positive steps towards . a renewal of official contact : first that the Soviet Government should make a gesture to satisfy British misgivings, and secondly that a group of British financiers and industrialists should proceed to Russia to blaze a trail for more substantial trading.
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