THE ALLIES

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 9 July 1924, Page 5

THE ALLIES

MISCHIEF MAKERS. ANGLO-FRENCH RELATIONS. VISIT TO FRANCE. •T OABL*—PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT LONDON, July 7. In the House of Commons the Premier (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald) said he was not going to allow, if he could help it, any mischief-maker on either side of the Channel to destroy the prospects of an Anglo-French settlement-. It was too horrible to contemplate the charge that the- British Government was trying to abolish the reparation* commission. ' He hoped, if any agreement could be reached on the experts’ report, it could be supplemented by an inter-Allied agreement. Then, in the event of wilful default by Germany after she accepted the experts’ report, the Allies should stand shoulder to shoulder, pressing her responsibilities upon her. But who was going to decide in respect of the experts’ report whether Germany was wilfully defaulting or not? Any agreement would be additional to, and not a substitution for, proposed in the Versailles Treaty. ” He emphasised that Belgium, Italy and Japan .were all satisfied at the form of the invitation, and declared that tlxe complaint against it was made for purposes which required further explanation. The whole affair was a mere storm in a tea cup.

. .■ PARIS, July 8. . Mr. MacDonald’s decision to pay an immediate visit, has produced a remarkable change in tone, and. has dispelled the increasing wave of pessimism. The visit is regarded as a .rebuke to the.unsmipulous anti-Herriot campaign. The Paris correspondent of'the'Daily Telegraph says that Mr. MacDonald’s decision has created something of a sensation in political circles, and is taken as proof of the importance he attaches to removing without delay all Anglo-French misunderstandings prior to the conference. It had the immediate effect of postponing the attack on foreign affairs which M. Poincare (exlremier) had- planned to lead in the Senate on Tuesday. Le Temps says: ‘-‘ln France as in England people like those who take personal trouble. The public will theretore cordially welcome Mr. MacDonald Nr <l™ ckl .y reack an understanding with M Hernot m ’the search for an equitable agreement for the security of the application of the Dawes Report."’

STATEMENT BY MR. MACDONALD.

t ‘ TT LONDON, July 7. _ In the House of Commons, Mr" MacDonald declared that there was absolutely no foundation whatever, for the storm which has arisen regardful /the invitations to the conference on^July 16, and pointed out that the communications made to Italy, Japan, and the United States and Efelgium, were pie,rely a repetition of the British suggestions concerning the task at the forthcoming which had already been submjted to and fully discussed bv the Belgian Minister and. M. .-Harriot at. Chequers. These suggestions were simultaneously embodied for the purposes of record in a semi-official communication from the permanent head of the Foreign Office to the-permanent head of the French Foreign Office. No communication in this fonnhetion had been made by or on behalf '.of the British. Government to the German Government. This communication would be published with a lengthier one later. —Reuter.