93. Air Commodore Harveyasked the President of the Board of Trade if, in view of the serious recession in trade from which the textile industry is only slowly recovering, he will undertake to give further consideration to the matter before increasing the import quota for textiles.
§ Mr. MackesonTextiles are of major importance to a number of Western European countries and are the principal item on the short list of goods for which all members of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation have undertaken to remove import licensing restrictions. It is naturally expected of us that, as our balance of payments position improves, we should relax our restrictions on such items and it is in our own interest to do so. We could not expect to go on selling large quantities of textiles and other manufactured goods to Western Europe if we were ourselves restricting imports more than is absolutely necessary to protect our balance of payments.
Despite recent monthly surpluses, the United Kingdom is still heavily in debt to the European Payments Union and Her Majesty's Government consider that the relaxations of our import restrictions which have just been announced are the most which can be justified in present circumstances.
Licences for almost the full amount of the new quotas have now been issued.