PRESSMEN IN CONFERENCE

Auckland Star, Volume XL, Issue 160, 7 July 1909, Page 5

PRESSMEN IN CONFERENCE

FIRST DAY'S SITTING. A COLONIAL IMPRESSION. EARL CREWE'S WELCOME. (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) SYDNEY, this day. " The Daily Telegraph " publishes an interesting account from its special correspondent of the opening session of the Press Conference. The writer says:—"lt was a striking gathering, called for memorable reasons at a portentous time, held in a place of gre*v associations. Here at last was Downing Street, home of splendid dreams, incredible misconceptions and mismanagement, but still of unrivalled achievements. Every editor present had tilted at it, ridiculed its importance, condemned its follies, torn it to shreds.

" Here, too, was its director for the moment, Lord Crewe, with courteousness halting and bidding them welcome, inviting them to stand up to him and say their worst.

" There was a strange significance in the meetings, which will surely make history. Both sides were painfully self-con-scious. Earl Crewe halted and halted, and threatened repeatedly to die entirely in the middle of a sentence. H e realised to the full the critical nature of the audience. In a sense it was a bad start for the Mother Country to have to put up Earl Crewe, and perhaps his weak opening will go far to convince the Government of the fact, so nobly appreciated by Mr. Chamberlain, that the colonies are the strong end of the Empire of the very near future, and worthy of the administrative talent, not one of the weakest, but of one of the greatest men any .Ministry can command. Not that Earl Crewe strikes one as a weak man, but he is far from brilliant, and not the sort of man to consolidate the Empire. "He stumbled along saying things which read much bettor than they sounded, and set the conference open and on its legs, but he had failed to ' spark' it as occasion demanded, nn,l the whee's on the first day went heavily. EARL CREWE'S SPEECH. After welcoming the dplpgnte«; to their surroundings, the Colonial Secretary got to business by declaring Sip liio '"lit the cable facilities should hf pi wed first of all. There were countless presrr'pt oils for bringing the various p.irt.- nf Lll - limpire closer, ypt whatever tlioir lonn. cheap communication lay br-hind all. What the Empire needed almost above u>l oth«r things was an increase of what in private life we should call e.ise and intimacy. As important as frequent communication bitween the Mother Country and oversea dominions was the intercommunication among the various dominions. EASY COMMUNICATION. In his opinion, the Empire was not I really united until the average citizen lof Australia was in a position to learn ■easily all about the development of our great protectorates, such as the two Nigerian Protectorates. and from the point of view of the British Government that absence of easy communication has its serious eide. It is extremely difficult, as mattprs now stand, for really accurate accounts of what are said and done over here and overseas to be reported at once all over the Empire. After discussing the limitation of codes, and their liability to break down on great occasions, he referred to the Pacific cable. It had, he said, a real and very beneficial effect. Tn a technical sense it did not pay, but they were certainly not going to forget in it-s favour that it had both instituted and caused elsewhere a very substantial reduction in rates. CRICKET v. POLITICS. Touching on the question of Press messages, with the incidental large increase when a cricket team is touring, he declared that though he would be very sorry to see the number of words devoted to the report of inter-Imperial cricket diminished by one, he would be very glad to see the number of words on subjects of even more serious import ijultiplied by many hundreds or even thousancs. MR THOMAS IN REPLY. Mr Kyffin Thomas (Adelaide), in thanking Earl Crewe for his welcome, justified newspapers in remote parts of the Empire. They spared, he said, no expense in obtaining news. Matters of great importance would be given in a much more extended way if the rates were cheapened. He defended the cablegrams from any extensive colouring to suit party purposes; in his long experience in Australia he bad never been able to discover any such prepossession shown, whatever the polities of the paper which interpreted the cables.

Mr Reed, an Indian delegate, moving the first resolution in favour of a cheaper and improved cable service, painted an amusing picture of the mutilation of an Indian cable. Journalists in India never dared to express an opinion on a cablegram, because it was practically certain to require correction when fuller news came. Earl Rosebery hnd asked the In-' dia.n delegates to give some guidance to democracy in dealing with India, but how could they guide the democracy in regard to Indian affairs with cables at a shilling a word ? POST OFFICE RATES. Mr Sydney Buxton, PostmasterGeneral, in a happy speech, cleared Australia of Earl Crewe's reproach about cables on cricket. A large number of messages were devoted to cricket, but that was due not only to its prodigious popularity, but also to the fact that an important message on cricket would go into a very brief apace. If the Prime Minister made a speech about Dreadnoughts, it could not be condensed in the same way as information about Trumper getting 100 runs. The British Post Office had shown its sympathy in regard to cables, but that sympathy had been on a cash basis. He was inclined to think that, as regards the British Press, the Post Office had been rather too liberal, because it carried their goods at a loss. He concluded by foreshadowing a reduction in rates. A general discussion on Mr Reed's motion followed. CO-OPERATION OF OPINION. Mr Austen Chamberlain had a great reception when he mentioned the name of his father, the cheering lasting several minutes. In the course of his speech, Mr Chamberlain dwelt on the necessity of the co-operation of instructed public opinion throughout the Empire by the assistance of all governments and existing cable companies. He hoped that whatever was decided the cable companies ■who had been the pioneers of the work would not be ungenerously treated, but the cable companies must make up their minds that times were changing and fresh needs arising. They must study the law and meet new necessities.

The first day ended with the appointment of a committee to evolve a definite proposal.