TPANISCRJPT OF
FRESS AND T. V. INT* E1, V7E WIJTH THE PR. LME MIN-iSTER THE.
ROTN0. OG~ iZES AT L ONDON AIRPORT ON MA: Y 3,1
your rea ctions -to the aercement that w-, as reach~ ed. i* n
Brussels ycsterday on Coemmonaaith~ manufactured & Dods?
PR7M MINISTER-That's rather a difficult quiestion to ' answer because
I ' ye read. about it in -the press flying over from Geneva,
but Ilve not heard any oficial acco-unt of ityet, and
thnerefore I speak with. some caution. B~ ut I -ima,; iJne that
an agreement of thLis kind can hardly be treatled as : 1final_
I don't know, because we're to have a Prime Minister's
conference in September and it's h-ard to believe that we
wlhave a series of arc, 1tsbefore thn. which will
render the conferonce unnecessary0 So I take it t, hat t.-his
has somie tentative quality. In so far as it appears to
recogn,. se a cut-off pointL,, or what's been called a
precipice, thor of course that's not quite our cup of tea0
W4o want -to have arrangements made thiatl are fairly permanent,
of steady quality, They may not be identical with the
old prefere,. nc-es thiat have caxis ted which-have gone on and
on and might hiave been expected to go on fLor a long time,
but(-in substance we? rn locking for arrangements that hiavke
some pormanent and protective quality, giving out an
opportunity of prescrv: Lng our trade patti. rns and of
growing as an economy, ThL-is is tGramondu-.: sy important
-to us, and 1' think iL-s very im:, portqnt1V for Great Britain,
perhaps more important than P. lot of people here think.
Because we're an enormous customer of Great Britain, and
therefore weo provide many thcusands of people in this
country with jobs,~ It's very imrortant to you, Jtis viery
important to us, very -Laortant frT the Cornionealth., and
so all 1 can say is-that this does represent a final
arrcangemaent of some kind., _ hnh ope it doesnt represent
what I mieght ocaLl a ZeCnerai pattern fLor-those agreements,
because if i~ t ( lid it wvould r-iutn counter -to the ideas th. a t
have boon pat p
Ubf'ich rather ibrings me to -that secorid questi. onn you
ha3ve in you., min, iy coL1eague MiIrr . icLia. Tn, has been
he ro with. my fulil acproval. and support 11e has put the
c as,,, e indotail, ' nor,: and in alrop,,_ with th-e iftll appro-val
of thec Governmeont and ra7slf, andt I thtind( i, with. great
abiliy. Ty here ri~~ e~ to bak up whatil ho s doing~, not
to water i~ t doi,.; n, not; ' Go qual-Ify iito back it up, and
perhaps discuss itin tbhose more gnedterms that ' Prime
Ministcrs arc su-, posed -to engage in whe-n theoy meat cacn
otheir, but no subtractions fromPj what Mr0McEwen has been
putt--'-ing)
Q. Would. you sayr th-1at the possikbility of this loosening
of Commonwalthi tiecs is a muchi more c-. ctio1nal matter in
Au7st ralia int is heora In D: rita-Ln?
P. M. 0 Well, I don't !, now what the oionis hero on t ; his
ma tte. of course., o, ti, a traditionally very St 0ongl1y
Cc~: mnw~ atI~ r cadod bul% I~ yer been an ol~ d Comm-nwca~ t
ha ras you mgtsay; for so I'eng now thiat I never
vundertake to say 1* jblat iny-d o) the conr thik a u it
So I don't know.
QUESTION NOT CLEAR 000 0 ( 3
P. M. Dontt forget this, that we in Australia could h-ave simply
said 1Look,~ there'~ s nothling doing , e have : prre-ferentJa
arrangemients wit roi,,, they~ ve been zoin on for years,
Thaey arc! satisfaCtor*, r tC' u) S they are sati-sfac; ory to you,
yoen must choose between continuing that way and going int'Uo the
European Economic Coazmmnity." M'Tat would have been legitimate
, uould't it? But we h-aven't done i~ t ie hIave, in facu,
outstandingly said 11dell put our officials down with yours3",
we've -? one to all th people in the Faropean countries
concerned, Doctor Westerman made a long and careful
analysed statemen~ t on a series of commodities,, ' Je've done
all these things because we've said., in effect 11' iol we
wont stand on tI; ho letter of the if you can rnego~ iate
a series of conditions for us whiich enable uis in s'l. bstanco
to preserve our pattern of trade and -to grow economically
thein whether you call it A or B, we won~ t arrie about that;
we're looking for the subs) tance." 1 And so, oiitstandingl1y, the
Astraliunnegctiators have been constructive very persistent
IVve no doubt, and they need to be per. sistent, constructive,
not standing on a letter but locking to the Lubstance. And
that, I think, is a pretty good approach.
QUIESTION NOT CLEAR:
P M. I am not passing a judgr~ lont. I am not saying wihichi, in
theo end result, is to be preferred, but I cannot believe myself
thlat if Great Britain goes into Burcpo and becomes a member
of the polit~ ical orga-n~ sati-on, I can't believe that hor relations
wit.. 4h thle Comonealth countries will bce as t! ie: Xiblo or-let'Is
say, as independent as they have been in thoe past. That's
net to say -that I am saying you must11 not do it. Not that tl~: it
would cut much ice anyhow, but 1, not saying that. But
I am saying that I don't think that the, Co~ rnoiwcalth will be
theo sameo as it was bofore, As -the Commr-onwalth has been
ch-ianging very very oap'idl~ r for a long time nowr, I suppose
one ffurther change might be acceptable to a lot of pecple0
All T sa-y is, the~ ro wil L a change. Gruat Britain as part
of srpcas an -Into g-r-od partner in & iropoan highl policy,
could hardly be as ndepondent a membe-r of thG Commonw_ ea lth
aS sho has been in thec. prst, thatts all. I Merely State itas
a fac.., I've got pest argui-ng about it
Q. You Jet ar obviously as a cha-nge, fox-tae worso?
P. M1 From the Comr=' oalth point of view. As long as you
under-tand that it eco a change for the better from tho
point of view of iworld security,, of a poucrorfui 1Europo-, a
powerful third g-roat Po;.-er in tewovld this may be'very
good, My observation is nolb to say that trtat's a bad tig
but that the Coimaonwoa1 th will no longor be th11e same thing
as it wa-s before. Well, I suppose th. at's clear enougA,
Q. Do you in fact, 101r, Pvrme Minisater, envisage Britaints
rol.. e in Europe. if it goes in, exclusively in te) rrs of its
bercorji*. ri g a memk-fbr of Q world po,, wer, or do you t17ir'-thiat
Britain has a choicee of staying out and of building l inks with
countries like yourself~' Do ycu think we have a real choiceo?
P 14, Well, look, 1 wouldni t like to answer that quaes-tion
because while the econoic iniplic. aGJions-of tha TrTetnty o-f Rome
arIthink, brcoadly cle1-, aK enougi-, the!., poliie. l implications
a-re as yet not clelnrly to be soeen. Be causce thiey ir: Ll, I
think, deve. lop0 It nay be tlnist the ir. tovio difi~ croncos
be: tween th Si~ x IEurcrpan countric-s will continueo to assert
themselv: Cs politically, Th-at? s very-much en the-L cards, and
if SO tho political -i. rn, L*-, rticn wilbe mach slower than the
a c u * 0 s
P M.
( Contd) PQM, econoric integration, We can't tell at this stage what
fo.-m any political integration will taike wheth. eJ. it, ould
be some form of confederacy or whether i6 would be some
form of federation, there being a world of difference
between the two things, Whether it would lead to a
common foreign policy, common high policies on various
matters, is a matter of evolution and, therefore, I am
not proposing to be a prophet about it, But however
far the development goes, or however fast or slowly it
goes, my only point is I don't see the Commonwealth
relationship as remaining unaffected the Commonwealth
relationship, mark you, being a pretty hard thing to
define anyhowo
That being the case, Sir, is it possible to reach
a verdict in September when presumably only one half of
the deal is kno. wn the economic side. The political
implications aren't then fully apparento Is it possible
to reach a verdict?
Look, don't ask me to say what will be possible in
September. All I hoped about September was that by
this time the United Kingdom Government, as a result of
its negotiated work and as a result of all our consultations
and so on, would be able to come to the Prime Ministers
and say " Jell, it looks to us as if this kind of an
arrangement might be got, Now, as this affects all of
you, will you speak up and tell us what you think about
it. We want to get your judgment before we sign on the
dotted lino,:" iell, suppose we had a discussion in
September and, economically, everybody is satisfied,
Canada is satisfied with losing preferences on manufactured.
goods and we are satisfied about something else. You
know, we are all happy in September about the economic
problems. Then I would expect us to say so. And have
these arrangements madco But one thing I believe will
have to occur in September also and that is some consideration
as to the Commonwealth and what has become of it and
what is becoming of ito Because, you know, it is not all
related to the European Common Market, There are all
sorts of problems coming along. There are many now
countries about to come into the Co~ monwealth fieldo
Jhen I first attended the Prime Ministers? meetings, I
wasn't a Prime Ministero That sounds a bit Irish but
I wasn't, I was deputising for one and that was 7 years
ago, And there were five people there and now there are
nine or ten and within a year, probably fourtoen or
fifteeno A good deal of work has been done on this and
if you have a look at the number of former colonies moving
into independenco, this Commonwealth has become a pretty
numerous body. And, of course, when that happens,
obviously we will havo to do a lot of thinking about the
procedures to make it effctiv~ e Unless we are just
going to have a meeting once a year That is a difficult
problem not soluble at this cmment. But I have no doubt
that in September it will come into the picture when we
are discussing th Common Market,, The Comnmon Market
will be the occasion, I think2, for some of those discussions,
Sir, is it your ~ imrpr-esion that the British Government
is jumping the gun on Soptember?
P. M. No, no.
4,
Qo Is that not implied in this agreement reached
last night?
P, M. Now you are asking me to make a comment on an
agreement that I haven't seen but have read about in
a newspaper or two, on which I have no reactions from
my technical people or those who have been conducting
negotiations. Now if I were a newcomer to this business
I would make a lot of inferences in the light of it.
I am not. I have no reason to suppose whatever that
the Government of the United Kingdom won't pay the
greatest attention to what we have to say to them.
If I thought anything else I wouldn't be here.
Qo Does the importance of this meeting in September
make you feel that voting procedures at the Prime
Ministers' conferences might not, after all, be rather
useful?
P. M. What sort of procedures?
Qo Voting procedures, etc.
P. M. Oh, don't try to sell that to meo Look, there's
one thing that is an article of faith with me. It is
that the Commonwealth is not a committee of the United
Nations. And that it doesn't have votes. When it
becomes a committee of the United Nations and has votes
I hope and believe that I will no longer be Prime
Minister and no longer have to submit to such atrocities,
Not a bad word, atrocities, for that either. Move a
resolution, go round the corner, see if somebody will
support an amendment; argue about sub-clause get
a motion carried, What does the minority do in the
Commonwealth? Suppose Australia is outvoted in the
Commonwealth voto? ' That do we do? Go and bow three
times, and say, " Certainly, we will alter our policy
to please youo" Not on your life, That's not the way
the Commonwealth has worked.
Qo But is unanimity possible on such an issue as this?
P. M, But we've never had unanimity. That's why woeve
never taken votes, perhaps. It's rather a perverse
way of putting it, but the only thing that's unanimous
out of a Prime Ministers' conference is the communique
not a word in which can appear unless everybody agrees.
And that's why these communiques are such frightful
collections of platitudes they're the one thing or
two things or three things that everybody can agree about.
Qo Mr. Prime Minister, the problem for Australia is,
of course, rather agricultural than manufactured goods
and we have been hearing it suggested that Australia
might find alternative markets for her agricultural
goods in South Fast Asia. W'ould you envisage this
as being so?
P. M. I think we have boen doing our best to develop them
for a long tine, But you nustnit assume that you can
get an alternative market for the whole sweep of our
agricultural products, because scme of then have been
developed with particular reference to the markets here
in Great Britain. Dried fruits, canned fruits are
perfect examples. But I would just like to :. ake one
slight correcticn, You say our great intorost is not
in manufactured g o If you ean by that that we
C901: 000920615
PMo
( Contdo) Q. P. M.
Q. P. M. don't have the same volume of exports of manufactures
however that may be defined, as, say, Canada, the fact
is that we are a very great manufacturing country and
people seem to assume that the whole problem presented
by the Common Market is the export problem. That's
not the only problem. If in fact the result of the
Common Market and Great Britain going into it is that
there is a tremendous exporting capacity, additional
exporting capacity in manufactures developed in the
European community, with reduced costs and all that
kind of thing, the Australian manufacturer is going
to have an interest in this, because he will be submitted
to the most enormous additional competition and may have
to come more and more frequently to the government and
the authorities to ask for some protection. I mention
that to show that, after all, trade is two ways. We
know thato We sometimes forget it. This Common
Market argument does operate both ways. As exporters,
of course, we are primarily in the primary industry
fiold, the agricultural, pastoral field.
May I ask you, Sir, if you resent the American
pressures on the British Covernment on entry into the
Common Market?
Well, I would prefer to discover for myself what
these pressures are before commenting on them. I will
be seeing the President of the United States and so on
when I have finished here. Well, I think it's time
I went to the hotel. I'm seeing your Prime Minister
tonight. If some of you will give me a paper of what
I have said I will be able to give it to him.
Before you go, Sir, is your arrival here today
significantly connected with the forthcoming Test Match
or is that pure coincidence?
Noe I don't even know whoro the Test Match is.
And if it's any comfort to you, I wontt be there,
There is a type of newspapjr man who lives on the
assumption that in the sunmr-. I never do anything else
but go to test natches,, it's a newspaper logend.
I go to as many as I can. I see, on the average, two
and a half days in the course of the season,