NOTES OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 105, 28 January 1931, Page 8

NOTES OF THE DAY

It is understood that the Wellington Ratepayers’ Association has decided to join forces with the Civic League in elucidating the problem of finding a suitable candidate for the City Mayoralty. This is so far satisfactory because the present is a time when parties shou-d pull together for the common good. The new Mayor will be called upon to deal with very difficult questions of municipal finance. The situation is obviously one for a worthy and representative citizen of high capacity. It is to be hoped that no effort will be. spared to induce the right man to come forward in the service of the city. Even if acceptance of the call should involve some sacrifice, it would be in accord with the spirit which should be shown by everyone in these difficult times.

A special representative of the London Daily Express has returned from Russia with a somewhat sensational story of the conviction held by the Soviet Foreign Office of the'certainty of another war. A provocative incident on the Polish frontier and the assassination of another Soviet Ambassador at Warsaw are considered at Moscow to be the inevitable precursors of a Russian declaration of hostilities. Hence the Soviet’s preparations. This fear of wa’ seems to have become an obsession in Russia. It proceeds partly, no doubt, from the consciousness that the Soviet has no friends in Europe, that whatever sympathy might have been reckoned upon has been frozen by her methods of propaganda. That in itself is enough to induce a state of “nerves” somewhat akin to the mental condition which assails a certain type of individual when completely isolated from his fellows.

Making due allowances for party differences on questions of broad principle, the discussion in the House of Commons on the India Round Table Conference was conducted in a national spirit. Enough was said on the Conservative and Liberal sides to indicate the limits of safety to which the Government’s legislative concessions to India should go. Much will depend, of course, upon the attitude of the Gandhist section toward the tentative suggestions which emanated from the Conference itself. In this connection the action of the Indian Government in releasing Gandhi and his associates from prison and suspending temporarily the restrictions against unlawful associations as a measure of propitiation, may or may not have been wise. It will depend entirely upon how the released irreconcilables employ Itheir liberty. At the worst they can be re-interned if they do not behave reasonably, but in the interim much harm might be done. As the London Daily Telegraph observes, this amnesty is in “the dubious category of those experiments which can be justified only by success.”

To the average man it will appear as a “one-sided” arrangement whereby the Lower Hutt Borough Council is not able to take advantage of Australia’s unfavourable exchange position to make interest payments in Melbourne. If the exchange were against New Zealand there would be no doubt that the council would have to pay a premium for funds. As a matter of fact, local bodies and the Government at present have to pay £lO7/10/- for every hundred pounds of interest due in London and in a full year this will cost ratepayers and taxpayers an extra £600,000. If they have to nay when the rate is against them, it would surely be only fair and just that they should, benefit when, as at present with Australia, the exchange is theoretically in their favour. Possibly the banks will argue that’ the Australian rate is not in fact favourable but is an artificial or “blocking” rate, but laymen are puzzled when they find it acts only one way, against Australia but not for New Zealand. The banks would avoid serious misunderstandings and possibly groundless charges of exploitation if they would explain simply and clearly the justification for their present procedure with Australian exchange.

South Africa’s new Governor-General, the Earl of Clarendon, was, it is stated, appointed solely on the recommendation of the Union Government without the intervention of the Imperial Government. In this connection there is a slight difference from the precedent of the Australian Government in recommending the appointment of a citizen of the Commonwealth. The latter appointment raised considerable discussion in the British Press. The Times and Morning Post each stressed the point that as under the Imperial Conference resolutions of 1926 the Governors-General in the dominions were to be the direct representatives of the Crown and not of the British Government, the King should be allowed a personal discretion in their appointments. The Times doubted whether his Majesty knew enough of Sir Isaac Isaacs, if he knew him at all, to be in a position to give his approval of the Australian Governor-Generalship more than the appearance of an empty formality. The Morning Post emphasised the point that if the Royal discretion were real and effective, appointments so made would remove all danger of political partisanship and self-interest. This danger South Africa seems to have escaped, as it is clear from the identity of the new Governor-General that he must have been known and acceptable to the King.