MR. BALDWIN'S DEFENCE

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 19, 23 January 1924, Page 7

MR. BALDWIN'S DEFENCE

RESPONSIBILITY HIS ALONE.

I (EJBTgrfS TBLEORAH.) LONDON, 22nd January. Mr. Baldwin, who was loudly cheered by Ministerialists, termed Mr. Asquith I an obstetric physician about to bring i a child into the world, saying : "If this i child is not such as 1 fancy when born, I shall smother it." Ho declared that the Liberal Party only g"t its number at the last election by telling the voters to keep out the Socialist Party. Ho reviewed the Government's achievements, like the settlement of the ! American debt, the maintenance of the ' Entente, the Treaty with Turkey, the ! practical settlement of the Tangier question, ami thn bootlegging differences with the United States, leaving the relations with the United States better than ever they had been. The Government would leave its sue-

cessorg, no outstanding problems, except reparations, which looked more hopeful, and unemployment. The responsibility for the policy was his alone. He was not driven into it by someone else, but the decision to go to the country, was the decision of a united Government. He had a clear conscience. Mr. Macdonald would not be able to form a Socialist State on the shifting sands of one-fifth of the national vote. The. Conservatives looked forward confidently, without apprehension, standing for three basic principles, namely, the maintenance of the institutions of the Empire, preservation and development of the Empire, and the improvement of the conditions of their own people. He asserted that the future lay between the Labour Party and the Conservatives. A STEP FOR THE BETTER Mr. Ramsay Macdonald said that the ■House was going to take a step which lie believed, with all his heart and soul, would be marked in- the history of the country for good. He appealed to the House, if the amendment was decisively carried, to adopt then the Address. The House would meet a new Government. The remainder of the sentence was drowned by Ministerial and some Liberal cries of -" No!" A Labour Government mis;ht create many fears, but what would be still more worse would be the action which would degrade the House, bring it to a deadlock, produce a sort of stalemate, and show their incapacity to govern tie claimed that the,chief reason that toreign politics, wero improving was the prospect of the change of Government. One peat Continental diplomatist had said to him : "Since you had an election lin England the ice which was gettine thicker and thicker around us is 'beeinmng to break." Sir Douglas Hogg wound up for the un°nn rr ien>M nd, Mr- Maodonald thereupon moved the closure, which was earned without a division. The Honw thereupon divided, and adopted the Lab our amendment by 328 votes to 256