VALUABLE WORK

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 128, 30 May 1917, Page 8

VALUABLE WORK

BY NEW ZEALAND MINISTERS

IN ENGLAND

A SATISFACTORY MISSION.

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

LONDON, 27th March,

The London correspondent who wrote at the end of October that Mr. Massey and Sir Joseph Ward were not filling the public eye in England as Mr. Hughes did has probably often since then pondered on the mutability of human affairs. Mr. Hughes's great abilities are unquestioned. It is unquestioned, too, that he sounded a tocsin here that badly wanted sounding. But his hearing in the Old Country was reverberated and megaphoned by a certain number of papers ■—with their cable influence —which saw in him a fine party card with which to trump their opponents. Whether Mr. Hughes quite realised this himself I do not know, but he must have suspected that there was something not quite genuine in his popularity when he read, on his voyage home,' that the unburied ichthyosauri and some ladies had actually signed a petition asking him to come back from Australia and became Prime Minister of England.

Anyhow, some water has passed beneath the bridge in Australia, and to,day, while Mr. Massey and Sir Joseph Ward undoubtedly represent 90 per cent, of New Zealand, Mr. Hughes stands in the position of representing perhaps not half of Australia. . These things matter a good deal, and- it saves Mr. Hughes some bashfulness that he is not at the Imperial Conference of 1917.

In point of fact Mr. Massey and Sir Joseph Ward are both much stronger in England to-day than they were three or four months ago. In the eariy days of their stay they did a good deal of routine business, and it was not till November that they were at all free to go about the country making speeches. Nevertheless, they did very clearly and distinctly state the case for New Zealand in their first weeks in England, and the suggestion that they did not speak out on the question of the Germans in the Pacific Islands is quite false. This was one of the first claims they made, both in interviews and in speeches. As early as 25th October Mr. Massey said at the Pilgrims' Club: "We took possession of Samoa, and we hold it for the Imperial Government, but we mean to keep it. We do not want German neighbours in the Pacific any more." Close on the heels of that speech the British Govenment,, through Mr. Walter 1 Long, stated plainly that Samoa would not be given back. WHO DEMANDED THE CONFERENCE ? Then it was undoubtedly the demand made by Mr. Massey and Sir Joseph that led to the calling of the present conference.. They had 1 said clearly in October that, the Dominions could not be expected to wait 25 years for closer relations, and. they based their demand o-.i the fact that by the force of circumstances the Dominions are, now being heavily taxed without having any regular representation in the councils which spend their money and their lives. That demand led up to the new Government's announcement that an Imperial Conference would be called, and from that mo-. ment the New Zealand representatives loomed larger and larger in the public eye. They now occupy the position of representatives who really represent their Dominion, and who -have put forward and proved the case for the Dominions. Ordinarily visiting Ministers would have outstayed their welcome in six months, but there is no sign of that with our Ministers. On the contrary, they hold a much stronger position now than they did before. They have survived the ar- ■ rival of Sir Robert Borden arid of the attractive personality of .General Smuts, and show no signs at all of going down hill. It is agreed here that they have represented New Zealand in a completely satisfactory, manner,. and -have been able by the length of their stay to keep touch with the British Ministers and Departments, and to arrange many things which, but for their presence would have. been "impossible."