The Dominion. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 10, 1908. THE EMPIRE AND THE PRESS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 95, 15 January 1908, Page 6

The Dominion. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 10, 1908. THE EMPIRE AND THE PRESS.

—o ■ The Government has ■ 'apparently taken no fresh steps, nor come to any decision upon a plan of action, in fui> therance of the Premier's desire to have larger , quantities of New Zealand news published in the British Press. Nbr are we at all certain, that "the pro r ject would meet with very much Success should a workable arrangement be arrived at. Newspapers, as a rule, print the news! which experience lias, shown to be required by their readers, and, if the London public desired to know , more about New Zealand, the best section of the London Press would not require much pressing to give the public what' it wanted. The" case of Canada is not'on all fours, with New Zealand's case, as the resolutions passed by the British Columbia Board bf Trade make abundantly' clear. There the complaint is, not that Canada receives scanty attention in Greijt : Britain—for, as a matr ter of fact, the London newspaper reader is given, a? much information about Canada, in thp Jishape" of cable news and innumerable special articles, as about America —but that American newspapers land magazines have been flooding the country to the exclusion of English periodicals, and that much of the British and Continental news published in Canada comes through American agencies. The British Columbia Board of Trade accordingly asks the Canadian Government to subsidise "an association of Canadian newspapers " for the improvement of the telegraphic news' seiv vice within that Dominion, and to artrange for the free use for Press purposes of certain Government telegrapli connections. It is not long since "intellectual preference," as it is called, was established in Canada by a postal revision that was intended to penalise American publications so heavily as to encourage the importation aiid dissemination of the British article, It is highly probable, therefore, now that the principle has been established, that Canada will take action along the'lines suggested by the British Columbia Board of Trade. We lope that New Zealand, however, will refrain from establishing the system of " subsidised newspaper's," whatever it may do in the matter of supplying the " free news" that the Premier appears to have in mind. If Sir Joseph Ward were a journalist, he would know that few, if any, newspapers of repute in London would undertake-to publi§hthe matter sent by his free official news bureau. The British Press has no axe to grind in severely limiting the space which it gives to the New Zealand events that seem so momentous to* us', but that look wonderfully small lfi ; ,000 miles away. Nobody would rejoice more, heartily than the London editors if the affairs of New Zealand made " good copy." We are afraid that the good intentions of the Premier would have an ignominious consummation in the waste-paper-baskets of the London newspaper offices. He may send as much official .news as he pleases, but he cannot persuade British journalists to change their beliefs respecting the value of news. But against all proposals of a free cable service and the State subsidising of newspapers, there stands what is, .to our mind, the overwhelming objection that unless left perfectly free from favours, and their resultant obligations, the Press must, lose most of its value.