For instance, events have proved wrong the forecast which the right hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Eden) made in this House on 26th October, that a New Dollar Crisis was "not many months away " - not a very helpful remark, as I thought at the time, even if it had proved to be true.

A fall in prices, if it should come, would help the U.K. balance but would quickly land the Sterling Area in a New Dollar Crisis.

They may well feel that this is not the time for building up stocks with the price trends as they are, but what it means is that if it were left to them Lancashire would be extremely vulnerable in an emergency, if, for instance, we ran again into a New Dollar Crisis necessitating economy in dollar purchases, or if we ran into another state of affairs such as those in 1950 and 1951 when there was a short American crop and the American Government severely rationed supplies to us far below the proportion of the supplies we ought to have had, or if there were a military emergency.

How does the President think that the present dual system, or, worse still, an entirely private system, would operate if we run into a New Dollar Crisis?

If the Chancellor leaves all these loopholes open throughout the summer, he will only have himself to blame if he plunges us into a New Dollar Crisis in August and September.