HOME POLITICS.

Press, Volume LIX, Issue 17882, 1 October 1923, Page 9

HOME POLITICS.

LIBERAL CAMPAIGN.

MR ASQUITH ON THE OUTLOOK

(bT CABLE—PBKS3 ABSOCIATIOK—COPTBIOHT.) (acstrauan akd x.z. cablb assocutioji.)

LONDON, September 28,

Mr Asqnith, inaugurating the Liberal autumn campaign, said that conditions abroad were serious. The Peace Treaties presented a sadly battered appearance. Though the League of Nations had performed a great and lasting service to Europe and mankind, one of its fundamental articles had been openly flouted by a great signatory State. He hoped that they had heard the last of the Council of Ambassadors, as it could always be used to oust the League. The decision of the Ambassadors' Council against Greece was astonishing. It did not enhance the Council's reputation for justice and impartiality. Italy's high-handed action against Greece showed that the sanctity of the covenants and authority of tho League of Nations wero at stake. They looked to the League to itesert both. If it did, it would carry the support of the vast majority of people. He condemned the Treaty of Lausanne, which had recreated with new life the authority of the Ottoman power in Europe. The other Treaties made had proved unworkable, with the result that revolutions and dictatorships everywhere wero the order of the day.

He condemned the Government's handling of reparations and the Buhr occupation. Ho aßked what -was the Government's policy. The occupation of the Ruhr by Trance had been made at the cost of the Allies, who, as a result of Germany's collapse, were worse off than at the beginning of the year. He was anxious for the reconstruction of the Entente, but if it were to be reconstructed, it must not bo upon the lines proclaimed by M. Poincare, bat on lines carrying a prospect of the final settlement of European troubles within the horizon of practical politics. Dealing with homo politics, he Baid that the conditions were equally disquieting. The country's domestic situation was one of as great delicacy and perplexity as any ho remembered. Taxation since 1914 had quadrupled. Oversea trade had been reduced 35 per cent. Unemployment was double what it was during the greatest depression of the decade preceding the war. The Protectionists had come out into the open with a challenge which the Liberals accepted. The McKenna Duties, imposed for war purposes, had been retained. Imperial preference was being introduced in homeopathic, doses. He doclared that the idea of a self-support-ing Empire was chimerical, and concluded by thanking God that the Liberals were not responsible for tho transactions of the past four years.

MR W. CHAMBERLAIN'S RETORT.

(Received September 30th, 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, September 29.

Retorting to Mr Asquith's speech, Mr Neville Chamberlain said it was equivalent to saying to the Dominion representatives: "Wo are sorry, good friends, but you have come for nothing because your ideas of common helpfulness are a mischievous chimera. We do not want a ring fence. Kindly abolish the 25 per cent, preference you give our manufacturers and substitute free commercial interchange between, yourselves and foreign nations." He was of the opinion that in a generation or two the Dominions would be among the powerful peoples of the world. Their influence in .the Empire would be unlimited if they only remained united.

CAPITAL LEVY ADVOCATED.

(Received September 30th, 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, September 29i Mr J. P. Clynes, at a meeting of buiness men at the Rotary Club, Leeds, advocated a gradual capital levy on property above £SOOO, a man with £6OOO to pay one per cent, or £lO. Few realised, he said, that interest on the War Loan was the largest single item of the national expenditure. Mr Baldwin's last budget proposed a sinking fund- of £50,000,000 annually. This was a big amount, yet on this 'basis the debt would not be discharged for five generations. A capital levy offered the least painful way of escape. • Most of the levy would be paid by a mere transference of securities. No extensive bureaucracy would be required, as the existing revenue officials would suffice. Thetevj would yield three thousand or four thousand millions in. two or three years.

A LABOUR PREDICTION.

(Received September 30th, 11.5 p.m.) LONDON, September 29. Mr Patrick Hastings, K.C. (Labour member of the House of •Commons for Wallsend has predicted a Labour Government in England in 1926, with Mr Ramsay Mac Donald as Premier.