CANADA: Move Over, Cousin

• Share

In London's Royal Albert Hall, Canada's Prime Minister John Diefenbaker rose last week and told 6,000 Britons, including Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, that Canada proposes to "overtake the United Kingdom in national income and output in the next quarter-century or so."

Swept to power last March when he sold his vision of a greater Canada to Canadian voters, Diefenbaker was off on a 27,000-mile, seven-week world tour to sell greater Canada to the world. He has a good case. Canada's economy has spurted faster since World War II than Britain's or the U.S.'s. The nation's population has shot ahead 37% v. 25% for the U.S., 4% for Britain, 14% for France. Its standard of living outdistances every nation's but the U.S.'s. Full of such assertive confidence, Diefenbaker intends to champion Commonwealth trade and mutual aid—and he means that Canada will provide the aid. "The question which occupies us most urgently," he said in London, "is not whether we should help less developed nations, but in what form our assistance will be most welcome."

Lord Beaverbrook's Empire-thumping Evening Standard delightedly grumped: "To many in this country, it must seem regrettable that the movement to galvanize the Commonwealth should have sprung from Ottawa rather than London." By and large Britons were pleased at their cousin's bumptiousness; the Times headlined approvingly, CANADA'S RIGHT TO SHARE THE BURDEN.

From London Diefenbaker flew to a whirlwind day in Paris, chiefly spent with Premier Charles de Gaulle, hopped on to Bonn and a brisk handshake from Chancellor Konrad Adenauer. To both he expressed concern that the six-nation European Common Market might shut out Canadian farm products; e.g., in 1957, 30% of Canada's exported wheat went to these six countries. He indicated Canada could not agree to De Gaulle's proposed French-British-U.S. NATO triumvirate. After Rome this week, Diefenbaker will head to Pakistan, part of the Commonwealth he hopes to galvanize.