MINISTERS AND SOCIALISM.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 66, 17 March 1908, Page 5

MINISTERS AND SOCIALISM.

NEW DEVELOPMENTS. ■ TAKE OP A SPLIT VOTE. LONDON, March 16. "The Spectator" considers that Mr. Lloyd-George and Mr. Winston Churchill are protectionists at heart and anxious j to form a new Liberalism on the basis of nationalising railways, canals, and afforestation, in order to encourage home industries and counterbalance natural flucti-jations in the world's trade by means of bounties and other expedients. I "But,'' adds "The Spectator," "they' are unwilling to adopt tariff reform lest they should be accused of stealing the Unionist thunder." Mr. Whitely, the Government Whip, speaking at Pudsey, and referring to liberal defections as exposed by Friday's vote, declared that a small section of the Liberals were always in a state of semiSocialism, and considered that they were entitled to run with the Liberal hare and hunt with the Socialist hounds. ' "Though wedded to Liberalism," he continued, "they consider they are entitled to philander and flirt with Socialism in order to better their position with their constituents, but they cannot serve God and Mammon." [The minority which favoured Mr. J. Havelock Wilson's Unemployed Bill (a Labour measure) included 41 Labour members, 20 Irish Nationalists, two Un- | ionists, and "a number" (by a process of' elimination probably 33) Ministerialists.]