The Times December 27, 2006
Sixty years on, we finally pay for the war
Philip Webster, Political Editor and Elizabeth Judge
£45m is the last instalment to US
'Support helped to defeat Nazis'
Britain will this week pay off the last instalment of the multibillion-dollar loans that were secured from the United States and Canada more than sixty years ago to help fund the war effort.
On Friday this country will make its final repayment on the US$4.33 billion loan given by the United States in 1945. Canada will also receive the last payment on its Can$1.25 billion loan.
The payments — $83.25 million (£43 million) to the US Government and $22.7 million to Canada — are the last of fifty instalments that have been paid since 1950, totalling $7.5 billion to the United States and $2 billion to Canada, including 2 per cent annual interest on the initial loans.
Britain agreed the loan with the United States in 1945 in the form of a direct line of credit worth $3.75 billion and a lend-lease facility worth $585 million. It was intended as a final settlement for the financial claims of each country against the other for costs arising out of the Second World War, and provided the essential capital to fund Britain’s postwar construction. Canada followed suit with a direct line of credit of $1.25 billion agreed in 1946.
Ed Balls, the City minister, told The Times last night that it was a historic moment. “This week we finally honour in full our commitments to the US and Canada for the support they gave us 60 years ago. It was vital support which helped Britain defeat Nazi Germany and secure peace and prosperity in the postwar period. We honour our commitments to them now as they honoured their commitments to us all those years ago.”'
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2520100,00.html