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Sir W. Smithers
asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the favourable or unfavourable national balance of trade for the years 1900, 1913, 1923, 1933, and the latest available date?
Mr. Dalton
I have been asked to reply. In the years mentioned the excess of imports over exports of merchandise amounted, in million £, to 169, 134, 210, and 258 respectively, and in 1938, the latest year for which a figure is available, to £387,000,000. After allowing for invisible exports and imports, the amount available for investment overseas, as set out in the Statistical Abstract for the United Kingdom, was £194,000,000 in 1913, £140,000,000 in 1923, nil in 1933, and minus £55,000,000 in 1938. No corresponding figure is available for 1900.