NAVAL DEFENCE BILL

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 6996, 9 December 1909, Page 8

NAVAL DEFENCE BILL

PRIME MINISTER MOVES THE SECOND READING. MR MASSET FAVOURS AUSTRALIAN SCHEME. In explaining the provisions of the| Naval Defence Bill upon, moving its sec-l ond reading, the Prime Minister (Sir! Joseph Ward) stated that a departure: was made from the usual" loan procedure! so that bonds or scrip could be issued! for progress payments to be made. Thesewould be repaid when, the full loan, not, exceeding .£2,000,000. was xaised uponj the completion of the battleship. Thei 4 per cent, sinking fund would enable' the loan to be repaid in'eighteen years. Sir Joseph reviewed the history of the naval agreements under which New Zealand had made annual payments to thei British navy, the first ■ payment beiugi made in 1891-2, amounting to ,£20,700. He did not propose to deal with the posi-l tion which existed when the offer was] made. At the. Defence Conference thei question of naval and military dofencel was very fully dealt with, though the papers on the subject presented to Par-I liament did not contain the report oSj the main, conference, whore the state-i tnents made were confidential. The Gov-| ernment had secret pampers giving the fulli report of the conference, but these' couldj not be dealt with on tho floor of the House. Sir Joseph read extracts from the memorandum dealt with under an, .other heading, and said bis duty was very clear, viz., to show that New Zea-; land was mot prepared to maintain ai separate navy, but to contribute towards the maintenance of the Imperial fleet! and to provide the cost of one unit. This gave effect to what Parliament au-i. thorised before he went Home to the) conference. It must be remembered that, 1 as the outcome of Australia's decision, to have a separate unit, the three-oor-i .nered naval agreement to which Ncwl Zealand was a party expired as soon as| the Commonwealth commenced its new' policy. To adopt the separate fleet unit for New Zealand would have involved au annual payment of .£600,000, so that) New Zealand was bound to take the onlyj alternative and become ah. unit in thoi Imperial naval scheme. In the event| of trouble arising in Australia the; whole of the fleet would be required to protect its enormous coast-line, so that if New Zealand became a partner in that scheme it would be left without protection unless it established. a fully; equipped unit in its own waters. He, believed it would be a tremendous rnis-i take to cut away from the Old Coaii-j try over the naval defence question. CO-OPERATION WITH AUSTRALIA. Mr Massey said that the subject hadl been very thoroughly threshed out at the short session, and he did not in-( tend to make a lengthy speech on thej matter. It was not a party question, tuti a national one, and he did not intendi to make party capital out of it. The i>iil] opened up the whole subject of' naval d->i fence. Ho regretted that the papers re-i ferring to the Imperial Conference had! not been laid on the table earlier, as | members would not have time to peruse! them. He was glad to notice that inj the event of war the control of battle-l ships, so far as Australia and the China] units were concerned, passed automati-j cally to the Admiralty. Up to the timej of the Imperial Conference he had be-i lioved in a policy of "one fleet, one control." Instead of tho present ar-| rangement it would have been better fori New Zealand to have co-operated withj Australia. He thought this was the opinion, of the Imperial Government. The Prime Minister: That is not correct. ' Mr Massey said that such a proposal would have been more acceptable to the Imperial Government. It seemed to him that with the vessels it was proposed to put on tho New Zealand coast—Bristol cruisers—we would not be as well protected as we were with the vessels at present here. It appeared a most unworkable thing to him that we should be proteoted by vessels the headquarters of which were on the China station. He hoped a scheme would be evolved as soon as possible for national defence and national training in this country. He looked forward to the time when the three Empires interested in the Pacific —Canada, Australia and New Zealand—would be able to put a sufficient number of warships in those seas to keep tho British ensign, flying against any hostile ships that might come into these waters. This was the right thing to do. Mr Massey referred to an interview which the Prime Minister had with a Manchester paper, in which he said there had been no crisis when / the offer of a Dreadnought was made, and compared it with bis statement to the people of New Zealand, who had been informed, that there was a very serious

• crisis. "It is no wonder many of the 'people of this countrv came to tho con-clti-ion that the offer of a battleship was not made exactly for patriotic reasons," paid Mr Massey. The Prime Minister: We have heard 'that before. , . , Mr Massey: "Yes." lie complained 'that Parliament had been slighted in the way tho offer had been made. The nr-nnle of this countrv were in:tensely loyal, but they must be careful that thev did not put too much of a rbui-dcn on the back of a willine horse, ifo did not think they would Get the jjoan at 3i per cent without the Imperial ■" The Prime Minister said thev did not Iwant the Imuerial guarantee. ' Mr Massev wound up bv expressing 'the belief that in eighteen vears the '•bittloshin civ-en by New Zealand would !be on tht> scrap-heap. However they iwore- committed to the offer. Ho did •not want to so back on it. but he felt istronglv at the time, and had done ever since, that the representatives of the people had been i~norod. and he hoped jiothimr similar would j>~ain occur in •the history of thie countrv. OBJECTION TO THE AIETHOD.

; Mr T. E. Tavlor (Christchurch North) Ideelared that the Dreadnought offer was an ' Kvsterical action unon a iclovcrlv manipulated newspaper camipaign of misrepresentation. The Government should have been thrown outl iof oflieo for so violent an unconstitutional breach. The cost of the Dreadnought outrht bo fall exclusively upon property, and he would in committee .move that tho burden of interest should! not fall unon tho people of Now Zealand who earned their livelihood by their own individual labour. The leader of the Opposition took up the futile at-} Ititude of objecting to tho method but ;agrcoip" with the offer though it was! ;a constitutional outrage.' The country 'would like to repudiate it if it could ,ho done and he intended, >as a protest, .to divide the House on 'the second reading. The only satisfac*. itory feature was that it onuld in ai ffew years vary or, cancel it. He believed 'that in a few vears. New Zealand would |bo co-ooeratine with. Australia in the .upkeep of an independent unit.

JCO-OPEEATTON WITH AUSTRALIA JUr P. M. B. Pisher reminded Mr 'Tayloi that the leader of- the Opposition had. been p>accd in a very difficult position, because ho had been led to expect information from the Prime Minister which had never been given. The offer had been made impulsively, as the re* suit of a paragraph which had appeared in the Sydney "Daily Telegraph" on the 20th March. Tho offer of the battleship had been mude on tho 22nd March. It was the result of a rjewspaper scare. Tho country had been swept with a wave of patriotic hysteria. As a unit of the Empire, New Zealand was desirous and ablo to bear its fair share of nationul defence,' but at the time the Dreadnought offer was made, New Zealand was paying towards Empire defence Is per head more than Australia, five times 'as much' as Capo Colony, four times as much as Natal, Und eight times as much as Newfoundland. He could not understand .the attitude of the Prime Minister in holding aloof from. Australia -in the matter of naval <sefence. ■ He was 'not asking for political fusion, but for some method, which would be better than the present one, under which the Dominion had no voice in the disposal of its naval contribution. Far-sighted people !in England believed that a complete coloperation of the defence forces throughout Austa-al-asia was necessary.

Mr T. M. Wilford (Hutt) pointed out Ithat Australia's expenditure on its Jaeparate nnlfc would be .£4,000,000, and lite annuul cost, according to British Irate of pay, .£600,000. An important iquestion was the rate of pay, as it was well known that the New Zealander or I Australian would not serve for the Bri|ish rate.

Mr James Allen (Bruce) joined his Op'position colleagues in expressing sorrow ; that New Zealand lvud not been able Ito join Australia in following out what (Was an entirely right policy. At 1.50 a.m. the Prime Minister, commenced his reply. He knew the opinions of some of the highest naval authorities at Home much better than did those who had criticised the proposal, and not one of them of any consequence, except Lord Charles Beresford, said that New Zealand ought to join Australia. The separate unit would be too expensive for New Zealand,' and in case of :>var the British Navy would have to be at the back of it. An endeavour had been made to discount tho value of the China squadron, but it would be as strong 'as tho Australian and Canadian unite put together. , The Bill was read a second time on the voices. Mr T. E. Taylor not being present, could not carry out his threat (to call for a' division. The House rose at 2.25 a.m.