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S.M. BRUCE, IMPERIAL RELATIONS AND WAR FINANCE, 1939–1943
Author(s) -
Tsokhas Kosmas
Publication year - 1990
Publication title -
australian journal of public administration
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.524
H-Index - 41
eISSN - 1467-8500
pISSN - 0313-6647
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8500.1990.tb01990.x
Subject(s) - treasury , commonwealth , context (archaeology) , lease , underwriting , public administration , finance , government (linguistics) , commission , bureaucracy , economics , law , economic history , political science , history , politics , linguistics , philosophy , archaeology
This article deals with bargaining between Australia and the United Kingdom over some main aspects of wartime finance. Australian politicians and administrators took advantage of the wartime emergency to persuade the British to provide cheap loans with which the Australian government met its overseas military spending. The British Treasury also had to guarantee the preservation of Australia's sterling balances in the context of lend‐lease arrangements between the UK and America. A number of bureaucracies, public and private institutions were involved, including the Australian High Commission, the Commonwealth Bank, the British Treasury, the Bank of England and the underwriting firm, Nivison & Co. It is argued that the wartime emergency enhanced the bargaining power of the Australians so that they were able to extract substantial concessions from the British.