THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1924. BRITISH POLITICS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18827, 30 September 1924, Page 6

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1924. BRITISH POLITICS.

The session of the British Parliament opening to-day is fraught with more than ordinary interest. It is pledged to deal with the Irish Boundary Bill, and, if Mr. MacDonald's speech at Derby is any indication, the debate upon it will cover all phases of a very thorny question. The Government will probably succeed in getting the bill through all its stages, for no sharp party cleavages are likely to appear. But, Irish dispute given another settlement— necessarily final, of Parliament will adjourn until October 28 before facing the ratification , of the treaty with Russia. . Then will come a more crucial test than the Government has yet been called upon to meet. The cries of working men at St. Pancras station as Mr. Mac Donald set out for his meeting at Derby— "Stick to the Russian treaty, Ramsay, even if you fall,"— are an enlightening comment upon possibilities. Mr. MacDonald may not go the length of sticking to the treaty at the risk of a fall—he has learned now to treat adverse votes in the Commons as of no serious significance —but whatever he does is likely to test severely his hold upon office. The effecting of a treaty with Russia has become an obsession with a clamant section of the Prime Minister's followers. They made it a matter of party policy before the general elections. It was doubtless as an acknowledgment of his debt to them that Mr. Mac Donald's first step in foreign affairs on reaching the- Treasury benches was to grant recognition to Russia—with conditions operable after the event, as if it had suddenly struck him as an afterthought that there were folk in the electorate not so ready to whitewash Soviet Russia as were his Communist friends. His yielding to these friends obviously brings Mr. Mac Donald more embarrassment than pleasure. On this question, particularly that aspect of it which involves Britain's guaranteeing a loan to Russia, he is opposed by Mr. Snowden,. Mr. dynes and Mr. Thomas. They resent his engineering of the agreement without consulting Cabinet, and doubt in any event the wisdom of the arrangement. Can the Prime Minister afford to flout the opinions of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Lord Privy Seal, and the Secre- 1 tary for the Colonies, for the sake of ' the support of extremists in rank and file of his party? It is difficult to say. His colleagues may sink their objections for the purpose of keeping Mr. Mac Donald, and incidentally themselves, in office; but they may not. Should they not, Mr. Mac Donald may elect to consider them and let the extremists' support go. Can he afford to do this? Either way, he faces difficulties.

A further embarrassment of Mr. MaeDonald's position appears in a growing disinclination on the part of the Liberals to be, dragged at his chariot wheels. Mr. Lloyd George has already voiced his abhorrence of the idea of a treaty with Russia. He is not the leader of the Liberal Party ; still less is he the party : but, when ; the Labour autumn campaign was opened a fortnight ago, he was defiantly told that, if he and the Liberals wanted a fight on the Soviet treaty, they could have it at the end of this month. He is nov alone by any means in his preparations for a breach with Labour. Muttcrings in the Liberal camp have been growing louder since April. A new tone of revolt then made itself heard. Before that, the Liberals apparently were content to keep Labour in office. Mr. Asquith did not hesitate to tell his followers last December that their party was '''uncompromised, unfettered, and in complete and unassailable integrity." That party would not become "the wing or adjunct of any other party." With calm hauteur he could say—"lt is we, if we understand our business, who really control the situation." But when the party met in April the scene was changed. Mr. Lloyd George declaimed against ; the humiliating treatment to which the Liberals had been subjected by the heartless ingratitude of Labour. They were keeping in office, he declared, a c Government openly hostile to them, which seemed "to regard them as an offence which ought to be kicked out of the way." They voted for Labour in the House, and Labour set up candidates against them in the constituencies. One figure of speech he then used promises to become historic : it, has been quoted often since. Liberals, he said, were mere oxen, goaded along to drag the Labour wain, and destined to be slaughtered at the end of the journey. The position was becoming impossible. They were tired of fetching and carrying for Labour. It was time the party considered its attitude toward the Government. Those inclined to give full weight to Mr. Lloyd George's penchant for fervid oratory will discount his vehemence somewhat; but his statement of the position aroused open' enthusiasm in the party, and Mr. Asquith, from the chair at the I close of that meeting, intimated that he agreed with everything that, Miv I Lloyd .George had said. ' 3£he party

had been justified in putting Labour into office, but the time was coming when they must .take stock of the situation. , '

That time comes imminently near with the need to consider the treaty .with Russia. That provides a crucial issue. : But for Labour's dropping of the "capital levy and modifying of its policy in housing and unemployment, the crisis would have come long ago. Will Mr. MacDonald abandon the treaty similarly 1 An attempt to force it through Parliament will harden opposition against him, and may even entail defeat in the lobby. In that event, will he take the defeat lying down, or make an appeal to the country? Doubtless he would prefer to make that appeal on the Irish question, but there is far less likelihood of an adverse vote on it in the House giving him an opportunity to go to the country. All such speculation may, of course, be rendered pointless by the finding of some middle way that disarms critics and yet does not alienate supporters. But the Russian treaty allows less opportunity for compromise than any other issue Mr. Mac Donald has raised, and is consequently more likely to provide occasion for a fight to a finish. Clearly, no party in the House is fretting for an immediate general election, but there are murmurs that presage a storm. The Liberals have opened their promised anti-Socialist campaign. The Communists are crying out against a Labour Government that is treacherously serving the interests of the capitalists. The Conservative leader declares that "the Government must be broken." Nothing of moment can happen unless the Liberals in Parliament cease suddenly to be Labour's "patient oxen," but that may come at any moment, and, after that, the deluge.