WOMEN AND THE VOTE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 14926, 26 February 1912, Page 7

WOMEN AND THE VOTE.

ATTITUDE OF THE CABINET. PARLIAMENT TO DECIDE. A COMING REFORM BILL. By Telegraph.—Press Association.—Copyright. (Received February 25, 5.5 p.m.) London, February 24. ; In a speech on the suffrage question, delivered at a suffragette meeting at the Albert Hall last night, Mr. Lloyd-George said that the Government would carry the Reform Bill this year and would accept the responsibility of a woman's suffrage amendment if it were incorporated in the measure. Mr. Lloyd-George said that he objected to a referendum as being costly and calculated to undermine Parliament's authority and to frustrate the ends of justice. There was considerable interruption during the Chancellor's speech. Mr. Lloyd-George first gave light, and then sharp, retorts. The speech at times resembled a dialogue. Mr. Lloyd-George said that the reason that the Government had not incorporated women's suffrage in the Reform Bill was because neither of the two great parties were united on the subject. Three-fourths of the Liberals, including two-thirds of the Cabinet, supported female suffrage, and three-fourths of the Conservatives opposed it. There never was a time, he said, when the nation stood more in need of the special experience, and the sympathy of womanhood in public affairs, such as the pressing questions of housing, dear food, education and intemperance. The franchise, he said, must be based on broad democratic lines similar to those of the colonies.

Sir Edward Grey (Minister for War), a supporter of the female franchise, stated, in a letter to Lord Lytton in November last, that the .prospect of a real and substantial extension of the suffrage to women had latterly improved. It would be unreasonable to expect the adoption of a measure giving women an absolute majority on the Parliamentary register, but he would favour an extension on the basis of the Conciliation Bill, and also to married women. The Government's Bill was so drawn as to facilitate amendment. Such an amendment, if it secured the suffragists' acceptance, would be more quickly feasible than a separate measure. A member on the front Ministerial bench might, added Sir Edward, move an amendment if the supporters of the movement considered it desirable, but this would be useless without union amongst the supporters of women's suffrage in the House of Commons.