"The Big Questions" That Face The World

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 236, 5 October 1945, Page 4

"The Big Questions" That Face The World

"THE big questions . . . hard to formulate, harder still to answer," that are before the world to-day were defined by the Prime Minister of Canada, the Rt. Hon. W. L. Mackenzie King, in Ottawa last week, when he announced his-inten-tion to make an informal and, if necessary, extended visit to the United Kingdom and Western Europe.

Mr. King said that these last months had seen many changes in Europe, brought new persons into responsible office, faced them with new problems. "We in Canada are directly concerned with the solutions which they are seeking to these problems. Experience has taught us that problems of other countries very quickly become our problems as well."

In shaping a new world order a good start must be made in the right direction during these next critical months. Decisions that would have to be taken during. the coming month might shape and determine the kind of world we live in. Questions of boundaries, colonial administration, or regional disarmament were important, but in the last analysis many of them were of less consequence, even to countries whose interests they affected most immediately, than questions of attitudes and objectives. These were the big questions, thp worrying questions, hard to formulate, harder still to answer. What kind of world did we really wish to live in? What sort of effort were we ready to make to realise it? What did we and what did people in other countries mean when we agreed that peace and prosperity are indivisible? How could we help each other to make our world a free world in which we could give substance to the idea for which free men died?

ho Should Make Decisions?

We should find working answers to these questions," the Prime Minister, proceeded; "and find them without delay, for on the answers which we in Canada and in other countries give to these questions national policies must be based. It is the answers to these questions whitfh will determine what we should do about defence; how we can most wisely and effectively maintain high levels of employment and promote a fairer distribution of a larger national income; and how far as a country we can go ip attempting to assist the economic recovery of our Alhes and the restoration of the world trade, on which our wealth and welfare have depended " Mr. King said it. was important that Canada should not merelv be consulted but that there should be dear recognition of Canada's rieht to effective participation in the great decisions where questions affecting the general ordering of the future peace of the world were under con sideration. During the war, for military reasons it was necessary to acquiesce in the operation of wartime arrangements under which the | responsibiHty. for the major decisions off™ the Allied war £ °£ t ™, as concentrated in a few hands. The continued use of methods such as were improvised to meet urgent strain and hazards of war whereby private settlements were' arrived at between the Great Power! S n onl Sues of general interest might well become a source of difficulty anrl even of danger. Every possible nre caution should therefore be. taken to m this particular the warthe P er Petuated in the framing of the peace settlement _ and m the United Nations organisation. dUons