Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1919-08-19
ENCLAND'S WAR COST IS FORTY BILLION POUNDS Unfavorable Trade Balance is 800,000,000 Pounds, Says
 Premier. LLOYD-GEORGE GIVES
 PESSlMISTIC REVIEW We Can't Even Exist Without Re- covering Our International
 Trade" He Tells
 Commons.

l London, Aug. 18.-The British gov- ernnent has accepted the policy of , the state purchase of mineral rights in coal. This announcement was made by Premier oyd-George in the house of commons today.
 In discussing the financial and in- dustrial situation, the premier said there was an alarming trade balance against the United Kingdom of | 800,0OO,0O0 pounds which threatened to increase. He announced that im- port restrictions would be removed September 1.
 The premier was pessimistic con- cerning the financial future of the country unless consumption was de- creased and production increased Under present conditions, he said, it was impossible to compete with American imports in England. He said the government could not accept Justice Sankey's scheme for the state purchase of mines but had accepted in principle his plan for the unifica- tion and reorganization of the coal industry. sSs1 MT. Lloyd-George announced that legislation would be proposed to deal effectively with dumping" National Debt Huge.
 The war cost 40 billion pounds, Premier Lloyd-George declared. Most of this sum was spent for purposes of destruction. He asserted that the change from war to peace conditions would take just as long as the change from peace to war. The first out %o, c. ot oe f1n ci+ tion was the alarming adverse trade balance, he said.
 The import restrictions which will terminaA, September 1, he continued, had given British manufacturers an opportunity of making dealing in goods which otherwise would have been hurried here from foreign coun- tries.
 The national debt, he declared, had grown from 64O.OO0,00O pounds to 7,800,000,0O0 pounds.
 The premier said that before the war imports had exceeded exports from the United Kingdom by 150,- 100000 pounds. Receipts from for eign investments at present are down to 100,000,000 pounds while Great Britain has to pay back an adverse trade balance of 8O0.Oo0.0O0 pounds. Labor conditions in the United King dom, he said, had improved. Of the 100000 men demobilized only 35O,- 900 have not been absorved in indus tries. W Pensions cost the government 100,- 000,000 pounds yearly. Private ex- penditures in the aggregate, he said, was more formidable than public ex- penditures.
 Increase Production. One way of meeting the increase in expenditures is to increase pro- duction but the output is less in everything except agriculture, he said.
 He declared that if the country
 continued in the way in which it was going, the adverse trade balance would reach 1,OO0,OO0,OOO pounds compared to 150,000,O0O pounds be- fore the war.
 l "We cannot prosper" he said, "we cannot even exist without recovering
 and maintaining our international trade. We must bring up the trade balance, adding to our. exports and
 lessening our imports"
 "We have advanced some four bill.
 lion pounds to the world from which
 we are getting something like 2OO,-
 COG, ,000 pounds yearly in interest. We
 have sold 1,000,000,0G0 pounds of for
 eign securities to pay for war ma
 terials for ourselves and our allies
 We have borrowed 1,20O, ,OOO, ,OO(
 pounds from America and Canada fol
 the same purpose. Our allies in.
 cluding Russia owe us 1,8O0,OOO,O ,OOC
 pounds.