BRITAIN’S PREMIER

Feilding Star, Volume 7, Issue 2303, 4 September 1929, Page 8

BRITAIN’S PREMIER

TOWtj EDITION

SPEAKS TO THE LEAGUERS ON PERM A NEXT PEACE (Aust. find N.Z. Cable) .(Official British. Wireless) , Rugby, September 3. Mr Ramsay MacDonald, tbo British Prime Minister, addressing the Aissonibly -of the League of Nations this afternoon, said he- was pleased that Germany was present to take part in the delifio rations.- Y\ haf they had to do limr was to- proceed with the Work of developing the authority of tho League and laying wider and mnro ceeuvely tlmln ever tho loundn lions of international peace*. The League was going to buttress the pact of pence find onei ol the moist important contributions ifii- this direction. was the work of the conference j’n'.'t concluded nfc The Hague. The agreement arrived at would bo signed in a. few weeks. It was, moreover, a. proud moment for all of them to know that during the next, week the first of the battalions would march out of the 1 occupied area of Germany, facing homewards never to return again. It. was hopeful and encouraging to think that they were now met as member/? of the League in the spirit of the League, with unruffled friendship, co-operat-ing i n't the. work of peace. The League' must also set itself fo solve the. problem of disarmament. He urged the preparatory commission of the Leagjuo not to face the problem in the mentality of the possibility of war; hut on the assumption that the* ril-k of war is far less than., the likelihood of pence being per mnnentlv observed. They had to ask the military advisers to, believe that■ there was as much security in an agreement as in a regiment of (soldiers or a bathletship. The British G overn me rvt’s special contribution, towards disarmament must lie in the Way of naval armament, with in the first ca-se; some. agreement such as the one between Great .Britain and the United States, which must not bo regarded as directed against any 'other nation, but rather as a helpful lead to the rest of the world.

Air MacDonald said lie was in the (position to announce that the British Government had decided to sign the optional clause and the form of ita declaration was now being, prepared. It would be completed and put in during tho present Assembly’s sitting. Further, his Majesty’s Government in other parts of the British' Commonwealth who were, member.l? of the League had been consulted and he believed each of them, would’ instruct its delegates to sign the. clause.