Disagreement at Torquay

For six months, 1,000 experts from 34 countries met in Torquay, British seaside resort, in an attempt to increase world trade by lowering national tariff barriers. Last week, as they prepared to quit, 150 bilateral pacts to reduce tariffs were ready for signing.

But the British and Americans, often the closest partners at international conferences, had been unable to reach a tariff agreement. In spite of offers of substantial U.S. concessions, British Commonwealth nations refused to give up their imperial preference system. Under this system, formally established at the 1932 Ottawa Conference, goods moving within the empire pay lower duties than goods entering empire areas from countries outside the empire. The U.S. offered to lower its own tariff bars if the British would reduce trade discrimination based on empire preference. The British refused, partly because they believe that their long-range economic security depends on the empire trade, and partly because they were afraid that the U.S. Congress would later whittle down the concessions offered by the American negotiators.

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