§ SIR JOHN LENG (Dundee)I beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether it has been brought to his notice that the postage of printed matter from New Orleans to Alaska costs only one cent per pound, while the charge from London to Montreal is eight cents par pound; if so, whether, seeing that the difference in postage is such as practically to double the price of British publications in Canada as against similiar American publications and so lead to a much larger circulation of the latter, and in view of the desire of the Canadian people to receive British and American publications on equal terms, he will consider the expediency of equalising British with American postage.
(Answered by Lord Stanley.) I am aware that certain kinds of printed matter, posted under specified conditions by publishers or newsagents in the United States of America, are subject to a postage of one cent per pound. Papers sent from New Orleans to Alaska would, like papers sent between other parts of the United States, and also from those States to Canada, have the advantage of this inland rate. Printed matter sent from London to Montreal is subject to the rate ½d. per two ounces) which applies not only to printed papers, other than registered newspapers, sent from one part of the United Kingdom to another, but to those sent to any other part of the world. Any reduction of this rate would necessarily have to be of a general character; and I am not prepared to recommend it in view of the serious loss of revenue which would be involved.