THE EVE OF THE BATTLE

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 7302, 5 December 1910, Page 5

THE EVE OF THE BATTLE

LEADERS HAVE BUSY TIMES IN THE CONSTITUENCIES. SPEECH AND COUNTER-SPEECH. (Received December 4. 5.5 p.m. ) ' LONDON, December 3. The election • campaign wag actively continued yesterday by r the leading orators of both the political parties. Mr Balfour, leader of the Opposition, addressed a gathering of 10,000 at Grimsby on behalf of Sir George Doughty, who was defeated in January by the Liberal candidate, Mr Wing. Mr Balfour said men of moderate opinions were coming over to the'Conservatives. If the Liberals' proposals were carried the time when the House of Commons was a place for free debate would he gone for ever. The Government meant to give one-Chamber rule, and that Chamber would be working under the gag. The actions of the House of Commons under the group system may not in the least represent the people’s ’ settled will. • . , ■ . . , MR CHURCHILL’S REJOINDER. Mr Winston Churchill, Home Secretary, who had spoken in Cheshire earlier in the day, took special train to Grimsby and spoke at a meeting there till midnight. Belays of motors carried fragments of Mr Balfour’s speech to enable Mr Churchill to reply.; He said the Lords’ scheme of reforms was supposed to create a new heaven and a new earth, and very likely a new something else. It also would be thoroughly democratic, thoroughly impartial, and thoroughly Tory 1 MR A. CHAMBERLAIN’S DECLARATION. Mr Austen Chamberlain, speaking at Darlington, declared that if a Unionist Government were in power it would frame a scheme of tariff reform. If the electors disliked it and said "No," that would be the signal for his retirement from the Government.