Evening Post. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1912.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 137, 6 December 1912, Page 6

Evening Post. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1912.

WHY DELAY? To the various questions relating lo naval defence which were put to him dur« ing tho session, the Premier's Teply was tbajk tho Government/ would deal with them during the recess. A month of the Tecee® ban now paeeed hut the "Taihoa" policy is Btill maintained. As we have repeatedly pointed out, the departure of Mr. James Allon for London next week lias given ■> sjiocial urgency to the question. Though Ihe object, of his journey is mainly v sinancial one. ho has also importatit wtvrk to do ac Minister of Defence. He will of course confer with the Admiralty and the Committee of Imperial Defence, and he will learn much that no member of the present Ministry has yet had the opportunity of learning. But the process must be mutual. The Imperial authorities will want to learn a good many things from Mr. Allen. In particular they will want to know to what extent the Minister's address to tho Navy League Conference represents the viftws of hi* Government. T« he to' , rflfilx by ; inqvieajhe previous etue>Uaii ;

or talking about the weather, or assuring them that he will let them know later on? It is of course clear that the New Zealand Government could not produce a detailed scheme except after the fullest possible exchange of confidences with the British Government and its experts. But it seems to be equally clear that our Government must at least have some general ideas on the subject before ii can confer to advantage, and even these it has not yet given any public indication of possessing. It would be ridiculous to suggest that such men as Mr. Allen, Mr. Herries, Mr. W. Fraser, and Mr. H. D. Bell have not individually strong opinions on the subject. Mr. Allen at any tate has shown that he has strong, original, and well thought-out convictions, which have not disappeared with the assumption of a portfolio; and the most natural inference from the silence of the Cabinet, even after his Navy League speech, is that there are other members of it whose opinions are equally strong but in the opposite direction. Are we to assume that Ministers are something like equally divided as between the present system of cash contributions to the Imperial Navy and the local principle which Mr. Allen would like. New Zealahd to adopt in co-operation with Australia, and are going to appeal to the Admiralty to give a casting vote? That our Government can be 1 in any doubt whatever regarding 1 the attitude of the Admiralty is but another proof of the utterly unbusinesslike lack, of organisation from' which the greatest but most loosely-conatructed Empire in the world is suffering. But there is one remedy for this perilously chaotic state of affairs which our Government might advocate with confidence and without prejudice to the larger issue. Whether or not New Zealand is to have the partial control of a unit of the British Fleet in the Pacific or of a part of such a unit, the need of bringing her administration into close and constant touch with the Imperial Government in all matters pertaining to the common defence is obvious. The New Zealand Government should have a representative On the Imperial Defence Committee, and that representative should be one of its own members. This matter was urged upon the Government by Mr. Arthur Myers during the session, but was met with the stereotyped reply to which We have referred, viz., that it would be "taken into the serious consideration of -the Government during the recess." Is there any reason why the Government should hesitate any longer with regard to this vital point? There is no need to make the British Government or the Admiralty a j referee on this issue, since their views were made public property months ago. "I purposely use indefinite language," said Mr. Churchill during the debate on the Navy Estimates in March, "but there can be no doubt that in the Imperial Defence Committee we have a machinery most flexible and comprehensive, which may well be found capable— at any rate in the intermediate stage of the relations between the Mother Country and the Dominions— of establishing that real and intimate connection which ought to exist in matters of Imperial defence between the responsible leaders of the Government and of opinion in the great Dominions, and those who are concerned with the defence of the Empire here at Home." Here, as the Round Table pointed out, was practically "an invitation, cordially given on behalf of His Majesty's Government, and with the concurrence of the high offlciale of the Admiralty, to the Dominions to consider the desirability of fceihg represented upon the Imperial Defence Committee." There is, as we have said, no reason to hesitate or consult the. British Government on this point. It has made the j offer, and it is for our Government to accept it. Mr. Allen would go Home in a much more businesslike fashion, and with a much higher status, if he went as New Zealand's representative on the Imperial Defence Committee. Mr. Richara Jebb has recently urged in a letter to The Times that the Imperial Conference, and not the Defence Committee, is the body through which the Dominions should seek representation. Theoretically he may.be right, for the Committee is an advisory body appointed by a single % Government, whereas the Imperial Conference represents all the selfgoverning States. But, practically, we are quite sure that Mr. Churchill and The- Times are right. The position of Dominion representatives on the Im« perial Defence Committee wdnld be logically anomalous, but it is just through these logical anomalies that the evolution of our Empire has proceeded, in stolid defiance of doctrinaire objections, from strength to strength. The immense advantage of associating the Dominions with the Defence Committee is that it is a live, active working body, with a definite* purpose and a limited scope, in continuous and intimate touch with the great realities of things, and especially with those mysterious realities upon the true understanding of which the existence of the Empire depends, yet of which, under existing conditions, colonial statesmen are of necessity perpetually and abysmally ignorant. On most of the points that we have mentioned the Imperial Conference is almost the exact antithesis of the Defence Committee. The Conference is rather an ornamental and academic than a practical body. It comes within a reasonable distance of the realities once in every four years, and theh, like the House of Lords of a century ago, it "does nothing in particular, and does it very well." Jf this .censure is too sweeping, this at least is clear—that tho pace of the Imperial Conference is exceedingly deliberate, and that if it is going to save the flmpire it will need a considerable- number of quadrenniums for the work. Something must be done in the meantime, something which, however deficient in logical symmetry, will promote promptly and practically the Umpire's supreme need— the close association of all its statesmanship and all its resources for the common defence. The representation of the Dominions on tlio Imperial Defence Committee may for tho present serve this purpose bettor than many a more ani- ; DiUouß- project..