THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 1906. IMPERIAL PREFERENCE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13303, 9 October 1906, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 1906. IMPERIAL PREFERENCE.

Mr. J. Ramsay Mac Donald, M.P., secretary of the British Independent Labour party, has arrived in Australia just prior to the Federal elections. He comes nominally for his health, but incidentally to do his best to persuade the Australians of the folly of favouring Imperial preference and of the wickedness of Mr. Joseph Chamberlain. It was only a few weeks ago that British Parliamentary opponents of Tariff Reform addressed a manifesto to the Australian electors urging them not to interfere in British political questions, and particularly not to do anything which might interfere with the sacred Manchester Doctrine. This manifesto was immediately seized upon by the Australian antipreferentialists as party material, and we do not doubt that they will as eagerly seize upon the utterances < of Mr. Mac Donald, who can hardly be said to be abiding by a policy of non-interference. According to that gentleman Mr. Chamberlain and his friends have advanced the preferential proposal simply to make party capital and only* " mouth " about Empire, really wanting " aristocratic government.'' It is a very old rule for those who have no case to abuse the other side and to assume for themselves the monopoly of all the virtues; and Mr. Mac Donald's prompt display of this style of attack will hardly advance his purpose of influencing, the Australian Labour party against preferentialism. For everybody knows that Mr. Chamberlain is a manufacturer, not an " aristocrat," while , only those so hopelessly conservative as not to be able to. change the fiscal ideas in which they happened to be born can . question the logical character of the policy which he has advanced, or doubt that its 4 inevitable triumph will be to the advantage of the Empire and will greatly benefit the whole of the British people. Mr. Mac Donald makes a series of dogmatic assertions which have been made for sixty years and have quite failed to convince the civilised world. He assumes that preference means increased prices to the British people and infers that this is necessarily a calamity. But he ought to know that the worst evil of all evils is lack of employment, that when multitudes are unemployed wages must fall, and that though prices may also decline during "hard times," nobody is any the better off for this excepting the comparatively few who have fixed incomes. As an English. Tariff Reformer recently said, in defending from an" elec* tioneering platform the policy of Mr. Chamberlain: "Our present system is neither Free Trade nor Fair Trade. It leaves us helpless against Foreign Tariffs. It takes the work and the wages away from our own people and gives them to foreigners, while our people walk the streets. It encourages skill and industry in other countries. It discourages our enterprise and degrades our labour. It sacrifices the skilled British artisan for the cheap foreign article. I stand for Tariff Reform because it means more em- ' ployment and better wages for our working men; better business for our shopkeepers, our manufacturers, and our professional men." Mr. Mac Donald says that this is unsound, and that preference is only party clap-trap. But he ought to have perception enough to see that lie has come to British communities which have accepted similar statements as sound, which do not regard them as clap-trap, and whose established fiscal policies are based upon the theory of the British Tariff Reformers. Consequently, before they believe him they will want to know why. The colonists of the Empire do not wish to raise prices in Britain, nor would Imperial Preference do so, for the food consumed in the United Kingdom could be so largely produced within the Empire that foreign foodstuff importers would have to pay any duty themselves and could *' not shift it to the British consumer. But even supposing prices were slightly raised, could not this be more than compensated for by the increased trade and increased employment and increased wages which u would result from preference ? The

German Government does not wish to see Australia give British goods preference. Will , Mr. Mac Donald tell us why? For the exceedingly simple reason that* it will automatically cause the Australians to buy British goods instead of German goods, which is what is intended by preferentialism. Sir John Forrest, the Commonwealth Treasurer, recently told a London meeting that from 1894 to 1904 the external trade of Australia had increased from £56,000,000 to £100,000,000, In 1894 the United Kingdom did 72 per cent, of this Australian trade, British possessions 12 per cent., and foreign countries 16 per cent. In 1904 the United Kingdom only did 62 per cent., British possessions remained at 12 per cent., and foreign countries had risen to 26 per cent. Does Mr. Mac Donald call this satisfactory 1 ? If he does there is.no hope whatever of his understanding those who believe that Imperial Preference will be for the good of all British peoples, because it will prevent this decline in British trade. During these same ten years while British imports into Australia increased by less than 15 per cent, foreign imports increased by 122 per cent. Even here in New Zealand, the most British colony in the Empire, the British import trade only increased by 74 per cent., as compared to a foreign import increase of 244 per cent. When we consider these figures it appears amazing that any Englishman can be so dull as not to realise that had this lost trade been kept to the United Kingdom, -as "preference" would have kept it, the condition of the British workman would have been better than it is. Against this denseness Mr. Chamberlain has to fight. ; That he is impressing the working classes of the United Kingdom is shown by the forlorn visit of Mr. Mac Donald to Australia, for it is evidently hoped by the anti-pro-ferentialists that he may succeed in turning the Australian Labour party against the Imperial preference to which Mr. Watson is committed.