SIR GILBERT PARKERI beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can now say what, if any, differences in the rates of freights exist in the transport of British and German goods to Basra; and whether the German vessels bearing such goods are also subsidised.
§ SIR EDWARD GREYHis Majesty's Consular Officers at Bagdad and Basra
† See (4) Debates, clxxviii., 532.131 have been instructed to furnish a Report on the subject, but their replies have not yet been received. In a Report on the Trade of Basra for the year 1906, which will very shortly be published, it is stated that the Persian Gulf section of the Hamburg-American Line is, according to the statement of its agent, unsubsidised. The same Report contains particulars as to freights from Basra to United Kingdom and other ports.