Letter, with enclosure, from Seán MacBride to Lord Rugby (Dublin)

My dear Lord Rugby,
I enclose a memorandum setting forth some of the main issues which the Irish Government would like to have an opportunity of discussing during the talks next week. Please excuse delay in forwarding this memorandum.

I am afraid that the memorandum is not as detailed as I would have liked it to be, but it will serve as a basis for the discussion in general. Many of the issues which the Irish Government would like to discuss are set forth in the correspondence which passed between us in April.¹

If there are any additional points which your Government wishes to raise I shall be grateful if you could let me have a note concerning these at your convenience.

[Enclosure]

Anglo-Irish Trade Discussions, June, 1948

The following are the main points which the Irish delegation will raise:-

1. The Irish Government will press for (a) the abolition of the price differential in the United Kingdom between cattle finished in Ireland and Irish cattle finished in the United Kingdom and (b) the limitation of the difference between the price of U.K. fat cattle and the price of corresponding Irish cattle.
2. When the import of other livestock or livestock products or of agricultural, horticultural or fishery products is conducted by or on behalf of the British Government or where selling prices of such products are fixed at rates which entail a subsidy to the British producer the Irish Government will seek an undertaking that the prices payable to Irish exporters will not be less than the prices made available to British producers.
3. The Irish Government will seek an undertaking that Irish agricultural, livestock, livestock products and other horticultural and fishery products will not be subject to quantitative restriction on import into the United Kingdom whether such restriction is effected by direct quota or through the operation of State purchasing or otherwise. The need for this is suggested by recent examples of restrictions, e.g., reduction in quantity of canned meat purchased by the Ministry of Food and the total prohibition until lately of the importation of Irish nursery produce into the U.K.
4. During the talks which took place last Autumn,² the Irish Government claimed that, having regard to the provisions of Article 1 of the 1938 Trade Agreement,³ the British Government were not entitled to refuse admission to the British market of Irish products. The British Government maintained on the other hand that Article 1 of the Agreement should be read as if the only undertaking on the part of Great Britain was to permit the entry, free of Customs' duties, of any Irish goods which it was prepared to accept. The Irish Government cannot accept this view and intend to raise the matter again in the forthcoming discussions. For the past year or more Import Licences for a wide range of Irish products have been refused by the British Government and, notwithstanding an undertaking given during the discussions last Autumn to consider a relaxation of the restrictions, the British Government have continued to refuse the grant of Import Licences save in a few cases.
5. The Irish Government are dissatisfied with the rate at which supplies of certain essential commodities are being made available from Great Britain. The particular commodities which the Irish Government would wish to discuss in the forthcoming negotiations are set out in the attached list.⁴ Most of those items were discussed last year and in some cases the British Government undertook to do their best to ensure that additional supplies would be sent to Ireland. Failure to meet the reasonable requirements of the Irish market from British sources has forced Irish importers to seek supplies in dollar and other hard currency countries.
6. It has been observed that in a number of cases the prices charged to Irish importers for raw materials supplied by Britain are substantially higher than the prices charged to British manufacturers. The Irish Government will urge the removal of these differentials in price.
7. The Irish Government consider that the provisions of the 1938 Agreement are unduly restrictive in relation to their industrial development policy and intend to propose modifications of the relevant provision of that Agreement. In particular the Irish Government think it essential that paragraph (1) of Article 5 of the Agreement should be deleted and that Article 8 should be amended so as to remove quantitative restrictions from the scope of Prices Commission reviews.
8. The Irish Government intend to propose the amendment of Article 14 of the 1938 Agreement which, as it stands, does not provide adequate safeguards against dumping.
9. The Irish Government will propose that Article 16 of the 1947 Agreement be amended to provide that the U.K. Government will supply adequate quantities of coal, coke and manufactured fuel.