The Press Thursday, May 15, 1924. The Imperial Conference.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18073, 15 May 1924, Page 8

The Press Thursday, May 15, 1924. The Imperial Conference.

An important statement by the lit. Hon. J. H. Thomas, Secretary of State lor the Colonies, on the issues raised >,y the rejection of the Imperial Conicrenco's decision regarding Tariff Preference, is reported -in our cable news to-day. That decision was ill received l,v responsible statesmen in some of the Dominions, and the opinion has even been expressed that if its decisions are not, to be carried into effect the conference is hardly worth attending. Even so judicious and optimistic an organ of Imperial thought as the "Hound Table," arguing that no resolution adopted by the conference ought to be abandoned by any Government except after grave thought and the most careful weighing of the opinion of the other Governments of the Commonwealth, has said thai; "unless the deliberations of "the conference are treated in this •'spirit we shall soon find that the ''Commonwealth has no central clear- " ing house of ideas in which its peoples "have confidence, fto machinery for "securing common policy and common " actionj and that the unity and power " of the Commonwealth as a force for " peace and freedom in the world has "become impaired." It is now gener- j ally agreed —there never was any fun- j dameiital disagreement on this point— j that every' State in the Commonwealth is at liberty to ratify or reject, as it pleases, any or all of the resolutions to which its representative has subscribed; his name. We hare just seen the chief State, Great Britain, repudiate one of the most important of the resolutions of the last conference, and under tha existing arrangements there is plainly no guarantee whatever that other States may not similarly repudiate the decisions of future conferences. Although the perils of such a condition of affaire can very easily be exaggerated, and have, in fact, been exaggerated by many critics, it is obviously desirable that the conference, designed as an instrument of tinion, should be kept from becoming a source of contention. What, then, is the remedy 'i Mr Thomas, disclaiming possession of any perfect solution, suggests that the conference should he attended not only by the Prime Ministers of Britain and the Dominions but also by the leaders of "recognised official' Oppositions." This iplan looks very well on paper, and in some' circumstances it would perhaps work very well. If it were to be the rule that no resolution would be adopted which was not unanimously supported by a\l the delegates present, it is not conceivable that any resolution carried would arouse opposition or criticism in any part of the Empire. The range of decision would naturally be less wide, in such oircumstances, than .it is at present, but this would not necessarily be disadvantageous. Questions would remain undetermined upon which the peoples of the Empire are not in agreement, to be' sure—tariff preference, for. example; and the States of the Empire and their political ■leaders would be left quarrelling or free to quarrel. But the conference at least would remain an institution from which would jssue common Imperial policies, and nobody, would be able to say it was only a medium for the exchange of opinion, and therefore of little practical use. But if as good a result could be obtained otherwise than by bringing to- the conference the representatives of "recognised official oppositions," that alternative solution is to be preferred. For leaders of "recognised official oppowould not necessarily represent the body of anti-Ministerial opinion, and even if they did, they could not ordinarily claim to represent any particular opinion on Imperial questions. If it were on Imperial issues that parties sorted themselves out in Dominion Parliaments, they could make such a claim, but the issues whic" divide parties in the Dominions are as a rule purely domestic. The natural solution of the difficulty is caution on the part of the Prime Ministers. None of them is very likely not to know what 'the feeling of hia country ia oh any Imperial issue, and in any case each on© has always ample means of finding out. All that is necessary, therefore, is that no Prime Minister shall commit himself or his Government to any opinion which he does not know to be held by the State he represents.