The Dominion SATURDAY, MAY 10, 1924. A TIME FOR PLAIN SPEAKING

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 193, 10 May 1924, Page 6

The Dominion SATURDAY, MAY 10, 1924. A TIME FOR PLAIN SPEAKING

» —— Only a week or two ago, the leaders of the British Liberal Party were proclaiming that the MacDonald Government had strained their patience almost to the breaking point. Members of the party were urged by Mr. Asquith to develop a fighting spirit. Enlarging on the same theme, Mr. Lloyd George declared in a public speech that there was “a revolt against the humiliating conditions under which the Liberal Party was expected to keep in power a Government that never concealed its hostility towards the Liberals. . . . Mr. Ramsay MacDonald in three months had dissipated the stock of good-will of those who had put Labour rn office, and the Labour Party should reconsider its attitude before it was too late.’ Now Mr. Asquith’s hands are laid in blessing on the head of this lately offending Government. He is of opinion, one of yesterday’s cablegrams stated, that it is unlikely that there will be a dissolution during the next twelve months. This declaration of peace evidently cancels all that Mr. Asquith himself and his first lieutenant, Mr. Lloyd George, have lately had to say about the necessity of retorting in kind upon the hostility of the Labour Government. In these circumstances, the forthcoming censure debate upon a motion by Mr. Baldwin declaring that it is inexpedient to repeal the McKenna duties will become merely a political comedy. Or perhaps it will fall rather in the category of a Labour triumph in,which the MacDonald Government will parade the Liberals tied to its chariot wheels.

The whole explanation of this remarkable change of attitude on the part of the Liberals is, of course, to be found in the Labour Budget. Mr. Asquith and his followers are prepared to forget slights, humiliations, and acts of hostility which, lately made them almost hysterically angry because the Labour Government, as Mr. Asquith puts it, has withstood demands “for these ridiculous colonial preferences,” and has decided to repeal the McKenna duties. If it could be regarded as an authentic expression of the views of a majority of the British people, Mr. Asquith’s enthusiastic approval of the Labour Budget would awaken well-grounded fears for the future of the Empire. In the Dominions generally,, and nowhere more than in this country, the prevalent desire, we take it, is to maintain and build up the Empire as a true commonwealth of peaceful nations. A statesman who applies the epithet “ridiculous” to a measure of policy like Imperial preference is, within the measure of his opportunities, an Empire wrecker. Loyalty to the Empire and to worthy ideals of Empire demands that this fact should be fairly stated and emphasised. If Imperial preference were merely one of a number of alternative policy measures under consideration and each capable of serving the same great end, the position would be different. In fact, however, the case for preference as a necessary aid to the progress and development of the Empire is broad based on world experience, and Mr. Asquith and those with him who ridicule and denounce preference have no practical alternative to offer. What they propose is a policy of helpless inaction. Under this policy British manufacturing industries will be left to sink or swim under stress of foreign competition intensified by depreciated exchanges and a degradation of labour and living standards, and the Dominions will be treated in British markets on precisely the same basis as the foreigner. It would be baulking at the obvious not to recognise that these conditions could not be continued indefinitely without endangering existing Imperial relationships. It is not a favour or favours that Britain under her present leaders is refusing the Dominions, but cooperation, and it is on co-opcration that the whole future of the Empire depends. The outlook for Britain and for the Empire would be gloomy indeed were it not possible to believe that the policy.which is established for the moment by the Liberal-Labour compact will have a brief and inglorious reign. The cure for free-trade prejudices is an experience of the conditions that free trade, in the present state of the world, is bound to introduce. Whatever may be the case with Mr. Asquith and other die-hard supporters of free trade, tho British Labour Party cannot perseveie in its present policy and maintain its pretensions to represent the working people of Great Britain. If it is driven by hard experience to adopt a policy that is really in the interests of the British workers, the Labour Party no doubt will learn to develop a new outlook in Empire affairs. . . The position which must be faced meantime is that two minority parties in Great Britain have combined to support and give effect to a policy which is opposed to the present and future interests of the Empire. It is only natural in the circumstances that British policy should at present be under such a fire of criticism from the Dominions as has not been witnessed for many years past. A late contribution to this criticism is made by Sir James Allen who is quoted to-day 7 as discussing the possibility that the British Government’s rejection of the preference resolutions of the Empire Economic Conference may have somewhat serious reactions in Canada. Only a little while ago observations in this strain by the High Commissioner of any Dominion would have seemed extraordinary, but the circumstances that have arisen are also extraordinary In his particular references to Canada, Sir James Allen is only repeating what has already been said by representatives of that Dominion. For instance, the Agent-General for British Columbia (Mr. F. C. Wade) was reported recently to have stated that blunders like the British. Government’s refusal to endorse the preferences might mean the disruption of tho Empire. The time certainly has come “for plain speaking by all who have the best interests of tho Empire at heart.” It is those, like Sir James Allen, who are whole-heartedly loyal to the Empire who will urge most earnestly that Britain should realise her relationship, to the Dominions and the danger to Empire unity that is inherent in what for want of a better term must be called her present Imperial policy.