MR ASQUITH

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7449, 25 May 1911, Page 7

MR ASQUITH

AUTONOMY AND LOYALTY TO THE HEAD. Mr Asquith spoke for half an hour. After making sympathetic references to the deaths of King Edward and Sir Henry Campbell - Bannerman (l a f° Prime Minister), and. emphasising the non-party character of tho Conference, he said it was a happy coincidence that the time chosen for tho Conference should enable tho statesmen of tho selfgoverning dominions to take a personal part in tho coronation of King George! Tho Empire was made up of countries not geographically conterminous, nor even contiguous. It did not even draw its unifying, cohesive force solely from identity of race or language. “ W© have hero a political organisation which, by its mere existence, rules out tho possibility of war between populations numbering something like one-third of the human race. . . . There are two things in -the self-governing British Empire unique in the history of great political aggregations : First, tho reign, of law; and, in the second place, the combination of local autonomy, absolute and unfettered, with loyalty to the common head.” IMPERIAL EVOLUTION. In the early Victorian era there were two rough-and-ready solutions of tho colonial problem. One was centralisation, or government from Downing street; the other, disintegration, hy which each community as it grew to manhood would, without embitterment, start an independent existence. After seventy years of Imperial evolution neither of these theories commanded the faintest support in any part of the Empire. Now each intended to remain master in its own household; yet all would remain units, hut units in a greater unity. ELASTICITY NEEDED. There were proposals on the agenda aiming at tho establishment of some closer political union in the shape of an Advisory Council. Without offering an opinion he ventured to observe that they should not lose sight of the value of elasticity and flexibility in the Imperial organisation. Ho trusted tho Imperial Government would bo able to ■offer acceptable suggestions with regard to the constitution, of tho Colonial Office in tho matter of the segregation and concentration of work appropriate to the dominions from other work of the department. DEFENCE. Mr Asqnith referred to the far-reach-ing results of the ‘last Defence Conference and tho inauguration of the Canadian and Australian fleets, giving a further impetus to the spirit of selfreliance. It was highly desirable to take stock together of the possible risks

and dangers they wore exposed to m common, and to weigh, carefully and adequately the reciprocal adaptiveness of the contributions they were making to provide against them. Ido believed there was throughout, the Conference one spirit and one purpose—to make the Empire, in all its parts, a more complete and effective instrument for tho furtherance of liberty.