THE FISCAL QUESTION.

Feilding Star, Volume I, Issue 271, 21 May 1907, Page 2

THE FISCAL QUESTION.

MR CHURCHILL'S SPEECH CONDEMNED. [BY KLBCTAIO TFJ.BQBAPH — OOPYBIGHT.] [PBB PBBSS ASSOCIATION.] - (Received May 21st, 7.42 a.m.) London, May 20. ! The Times says Mr Asquith asserted that, as the Conference had not strained the friendly feelings between the Home Government and the representatives of the self-governing States, in the least degree, Mr Churchill's speech is an uncompromising denial or Mr Asquith's optimism. How Imperial unity, or even the most ordinary good feeling, can be liromoted by Mr Churchill's reckless anguage, we cannot imagine. Preference, after all, is a colonial policy, and has been re affirmed on our midst by colonial statesmen; yet he glories in the fact that the Government banged the door on preference. The Times continues: — "Another strange lapse from statesmanship and good mannrs was Mr Churchill's lofty rebuke, implying that the Premiers had sinned against the laws of hospitality. The Premiers did not come t> be muzzled. Our knowledge of •their Conference speeches »on preference is restricted to only a meagre precis, and to contend that the Pre| miers should thereafter be silenced because they might offend the Ministers' amour prOpre surely is folly. It is only going a step beyond this to declare that the Premiers had no business to ask ns to modify the fiscal policy at all, a view apparently seriously held in some quarters. The Premiers appreciate the situation, and they believe the educative effect of the Conference will be most important in its results.