BRITISH FOREIGN POLICY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13905, 12 November 1908, Page 4

BRITISH FOREIGN POLICY.

i The most comforting feature of .Mr. Asquith's speech at the Guildhall Banquet is his emphatic declaration that " people of Great Britain hold with unshaken unanimity that the maintenance, unquestioned and , un - questionable, of our command of the seas is the best safeguard of our national existence and the peaceful intercourse of mankind." Amid his sanguine expectations of an industrial recovery, his declaration ''that the Imperial Government regards the Berlin Treaty as unalterable without the consent of the signatory Powers, '* especially of Turkey," his protestations of goodwill to, every nation on earth, to " Germany not less than the others," this renunciation of any idea of reducing naval strength strikes the national note. It has been openly charged that » strong party in the British' Cabinet advocates naval reduction, 'and only a few weeks ago there seemed every reason to fear that it was gaining the upper hand. But recent events, including the extraordinary statements of the German Kaiser, have reminded the English people that the navy is not only their first line of defence, but ,their only lineWhatever the future may bring forth, the Territorial Army'scheme has proved a failure. There are fewer Englishmen voluntarily undergoing defensive training than before,, and it is being realised in-many influential quarters that in the United Kingdom, as in New Zealand, .volunteering cannot be depended upon for home defence. There remains the Navy, and Mr. Asquith would be less than an Englishman were he to take any other stand,- than he is taking. The Navy is to be maintained at an effective standard, and provision for Old Age Pensions must be found otherwise than by reduction in naval expenditure. Mr. Asquith must have recpgniscd how greatly this will increase the tendency towards Fiscal 'Reform, and deserves public commendation for a patriotic determination which '' may interfere fatally with party politics. «