NEWS OF THE WEEK
THE privilege of taking Marshall Aid for granted belongs to those who are both forgetful and free from official responsibilities. The officials can never forget that Congress will be getting to work in the New Year on the vote of further credits for the fifteen months beginning in April. To them the news of the past week will only have been a more than usually harsh and exigent reminder of the continuing task of informing, justifying, forecasting and appealing. There has been a statement from Mr. Harriman that Americans want to know what progress has been made with the four-year plan, currency stabilisation and convertibility, and physical recovery. There has also been a British White Paper on progress during the first six months of the Marshall Plan ; a Bill to provide for the establishment of an account into which the British Government will pay sterling equivalent to dollar grants received both for use here and for passing on to other European countries ; and an announce- ment from Washington of the final allotments between countries of the last instalment of the $5,o55,000,000 voted by Congress for the first year of the Marshall Plan, which ends next March.
For those who were not completely overwhelmed by this mass of fact there has been the discouraging news of further Belgian and French complaints that the British four-year plan cannot be fitted into a scheme for a viable European economy ; and of allegations by the Economic Co-operation Administration in the United States that Britain, Belgium and the Netherlands have been buying lead and aluminium with Marshall funds and selling it back to American firms at a profit. Somehow this mountain of difficulty will be moved. The White Paper, despite its announcement that the drain on gold dollar reserves was still £76 million in the third quarter of 1948, shows genuine pro- gress towards independence of outside aid. The co-ordination of the four-year-plans must be achieved or aid might lapse altogether. And Ac accusations of shady deals in metals—which are as usual hasty, suspicious, and ill-informed, and originate with an official who has no great reputation for friendship towards European countries— must be borne with patience. Then, if all goes well, the $5,000 million or more for which the E.C.A. is asking Congress, for Marshall Aid in the fifteen months beginning next April, may in due course be granted.
