Evening Post. MONDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1923. A CONFERENCE KEYNOTE

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 79, 1 October 1923, Page 6

Evening Post. MONDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1923. A CONFERENCE KEYNOTE

The steamers by which New Zealand's Prime Minister travelled to the Imperial Conference broke records, so that Mr. Massey was able to make the journey in thirty days. At the cost of some fatigue and transfer without delay from steamer to train and train to steamer, possibly another two days could have been clipped from the time. But though mails may travel this way, human beings, require at least some rest in their journeys. Nevertheless, Mr. Massey's trip has proved th*at the present everyday means of locomotion are still capable of improvement. While we wait for aircraft to bring us within ten or fourteen days of London, we may Beck to improve the tested and tried methods a^ hand. The Roman augur 3 professed to foretell future or secret things by observing the flight of birds. The passage of the steamers carrying Mr. Massey across the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans cannot be regarded in these mat; ter-of-fact times as revealing anything in augury. It. does not enable us to know what will happen at the Imperial Conference; but it illustrates what should happen. By the swift steamer passages Great Britain and New Zealand were brought closer together, for we measure distance now by the time occupied in covering it. It is the hope of all New Zealand that the Imperial Conference also will bring us closer together.

How shall that be done? There are some who expect the result to 1 be achieved by some great constitutional change, which will be as far in advance of existing methods as aircraft travel is in advance of trains and steamers. This may come in time. An Imperial Council clothed with complete power may be created; but it would be a mistake to wait idly for it, and to fail in the meantime to use the slower, but surer, means of progress which are available. These means may be improved, as trains and steamers are being accelerated. While we wait for the economic unity of a self-contained Empire, we may correct defects in the chain of our commercial relationship. The preference which is desired in some quarters may not be immediately attainable; but trade may be increased by other less controversial measures. Communications may be improved and consultation made easier. This will gradually prepare the way for that complete agreement which will give added weight to the foreign policy of the Empire. As a step to this end there is significance in Mr. Baldwin's proposal to open the Imperial Conference with an important statement upon reparation Bjr making this statement

to the Prime Ministers from over, seas, he emphasises the fact that reparations and the Ruhr are not the concern of England alone, but ot all units in the British Commonwealth. An acknowledgment ot the partnership of the liomin--10ns thus publicly made should strike the right keynote for the whole Conference—a note which may be heard and heeded in Europe. :