PRIME MINISTER

New Zealand Times, Volume LI, Issue 11739, 29 January 1924, Page 9

PRIME MINISTER

mi HR. MASSEY RECEIVES CIVIC WELCOME

IMPORTANT SUBJECTS DISCUSSED AT CONFERENCES

“ THE TIES THAT BIND THE EMPIRE ”

The Town Hall Concert Chamber was crowded yesterday afternoon on the occasion of the civic reception accorded the Prime Minister (the Rt. Hon. W. F. Massey). The Mayor (Mr R. A. Wright, M.P.) presided, and among those on the platform with him were Sir Robert Stout (Chief Justice), Sir Francis Bell 'Attorney-Gene-ral), Sir Heaton Rhodes (Minister for Defence), the Hon. D. H. Guthrie (Minister for Lands), the Hon. C. J. Parr (Minister for Education and Justice), the Hon. W. Nosworfhv (Minister for Agriculture), the Hon. G. J. Anderson (Minister for Marine, Mines, and Labour), Mr A. D. McLeod, M.P., the Hon. W. Snodgrass, M.L.C., and Councillors T. Forsyth* F. Meadowcroft, B. G. H. Burn, and H. D. Bennett. The proceedings were most enthusiastic, and the Prime Minister delivered an interesting and instructive speech.

A CORDIAL WELCOME

"FATHER OF THE CONFERENCE!. The Mayor said that they were preeont that afternoon, quite irrespective of party affiliations, to extend a civio welcome home to the Prime Minister of New Zealand, who had been attending to the Dominion's business in the Homeland, and had returned to give an acoount of his stewardship. (Applause.) He complimented the Prime Minister upon the good work done by the Imperial Conference and the Economic Conference, and expressed the hope that that work would be fraught with the best results for the Dominion and for the Empire. (Applause.) The Duke of Devonshire had declared that Mr Massey was the "Father of the Conference," and he supposed that the Duke gave him that' designation, not because of his fatherly appearance exactly, but because of the homely and commonsense advice he would give the Conference. (Laughter and applause.) As citizens of Wellington they extended to Mr Maseey a very cordial and kindly greeting, and were glad that h, had returned home so fit and well. (Loud applause.)

PRIME MINISTERS BPEECH

VERY STRENUOUS WORK. The Prime Minister, who was received with loud aonlause, and, on the call of the Mayor, throe hearty cheers, thanked | all present for their very warm reception and the Mayor for all the complimentary things he had said of him. The work; at ’Home, he remarked, had been much more strenuous this time because of there bein* two. Conferences. Some of the had had staffs of a dozen all told, including their representatives, but he had only Mr Thomson (his private secretary) and himself. He had, however, got Sir James Allen (tho High Commissioner) to represent New Zealand sometimes at the Economic Conference, and he did it very well indeed. UMPIRE COMMUNICATIONS. The question of communications was a matter that was dealt with every time an Imeperial Conference met, and rightly so. (Applause.) They could not shorten the distance between tho Dominions and the Mother Country, but their aim was to shorten as much as possible tho time occupied in travelling and carrying the mails between the different .parts of the Empire. Remarking on the fact that the steamer on which he had travelled to San Francisco bad covered the distance in 3£ days less than iho scheduled time, and that the steamer on which he had crossed the Atlantic had reached London, ono hour ahead of scheduled tim4, and Would -have beon 2$ hoars ahead but for a tog m tho Channel, he said that there was no reason why the mails should not be carried in equally good time. (Applause) Ho had reached Auckland this <f a y ahead of times and he and the Postmaster-General and his other oolleaguos ware going to see if they could not do the same thing with the mails. Besides the speed of the steamers, there was the question of the co-ordination of the time of the trains with the time of the arrival of the steamers. He bad had , < s ß ' ““ on that matter with the head of the post office at Home, and if they could arrange for such co-ordination it would bo a great gain. MAILS BY AIESHIP—NOT YET. There had been a good deal said of reyears as to tho possibility of having mails and passengers carried by airship; tmt he had never been very sanguine about that. Perhaps that was because he had some slight knowledge of engineering, and coold not forget the enormous wind-pressure that these vessels encountered at a height of two or throe thousand feet. He was very sorry to hear of the accidents that bad happened ■went y to airships. Of course, one never know what improvements might be made; out ho thought that we would have to give up the idea of having oulrt mails earned by airships for some timo to come DIRECT WIRELESS COMMUNICATION. < But there was one direction in which a great advance was possible, that was by wireless. Some years ago they had been told that wireless communication was but that communication , with the Antipode© could only be done by stages. But that idea was a thing of the past, and new they were told officially and plainly that there would be ! no occasion for stages, but that messages could be sent direct from England to any centre m Australia or New Zealand, ' so long as we had a proper station prepared to receive and transmit—which was far more important than receiving—from one place to another. (Applause.) * They were now erecting a ‘big station in England, and the time had come for us to consider when we were going to eas- 1 tablish a big transmission station here, c with sufficient power to take our wireless \ messages to England. (Apiplause.) We 1 could not afford to be left behind in these ' matters; and wo were not going to be 1 left behind if we could help it. He ' thought that a station would be an accomplished fact without our having to ' wait very Jong for it. (Applause.) Ho 1 was very glad that New Zealand had been the first to revert to penny postage after the war. He thought that was ! greatly to the credit of this little country, which had eo often led the way in Imperial matters. (Applause.) . EMPIRE EXHIBITION. , to the Empire Exhibition, * Mr Massey said that it presented a great 1 opportunity that should not be missed < for advertising the primary produce, and the manufactures, and the scenic beau- 1 ties of this country; and he was glad 1 that we had a good committee at Doth I end© to see to this. (Applause.) It was J 1 a great opportunity, too, for tho great I British industrialists and for the people i

concerned in tbe great workshops that ho was glad to say still existed at Home, to show what they could do. He would like to be able to 6ay that Britain was still the industrial and commercial centre of the world. But he could not say that. She would have to change a good many things first. We in New Zealand should be able to show our customers at Homs what we could do in the way of wool and meat (especially lamb and mutton), butter and cheese; and we must not forget our timbers and the fish we had id our waters, and the flax that we grew and what we made of it, nor the rugs we produced from the wool we raised. There wa sno reason why just as good work should not be done here as at Home; no reason why the Britiah worker should not be, as he used to 'be, the best in the World. (Applause.) BONDS OF EMPIRE. The principal object of the Conference; he took it, had been to help the different nations of tho Empire to Arengthen the ties that bound the Empire together. They had attended the conferences in the position of trustees, as men whose special duty it was to 'hold tho Empire for those who would come after us, and, if possible, to pass it on to them better and brighter than we found it, and that was saying a very great deal. (Applause.) People < ften said, that our Empire was going to decay as other Empires had done; and he sometimes felt a bit pessimistic and despondent when he looked round and saw. what had happened during the past few years. But ho remembered there was ovor all a Providence, and he thought that Providence would keep the British Empire together, for it had done more for humanity, for civilisation, and for Christianity than any other Empire the world! had ever seen. (Applause.) A recent cablegram (had tried to leave the impression that there was disloyalty in London, and that the Sovereign and the heir to the throne were not treated with proper respect when going to the opening of Parliament. Mr Massey, however, warmly denied that there was any suoh disloyalty. There was no doubt to his mind, he said, that that was an inspired cable, and! that it was to be taken with a grain of salt and a great deal of suspicion. He had not been in London on five different occasions, and sometimes for \ a long period, without understanding the ! London people; and he could only say, i "Heaven help the man or woman who showed any disprespect to the King or Queen, or the Prince of Wales when going to or returning from tho opening of Parliament." (Applause.) ‘ People said again that Canada was going to cut adrift; but he had seen n lot of Canada, and had addressed six ! big meeting there, and the audiences wlere just as loyal as those 'he was in j the habit of addressing in New Zealand, I and that was saying a very great deal. (Applause.) HIGH PRICE OF WOOL.

He was glad to see, be added, that one of the prinoipal exports of the Dominion was at a particularly good price; and so far as he was able to judge, that price was. going to last for some years to come. It was now higher than it had ever been before tbe war or afterwards The number of sheep in the world had gone down during the war period, while wool was waited just ss much as ever it was, and the demand at present exceeded the supply. That was so much the better for the wool-producing countries, oven if it meant a little more in the way of prices for clothing. It was absolute nonsense, he said, for people to say that the oost of living was higher here than in London. Why London got her food supplies from New Zealand, and had to pay freight for 13,000 jo M,OOO miles, boaides other charges; and there were heavy duties on tea and sugar at Home, as against only five-ninths of a penny per pound on foreign sugar here. , He would venture to say that the prices of tea /and sugar were two or three times as much there as here. He had (he utmost respect for the oradle of the race, but he could not help saying 1 haf. the people were ten times better off hero than nr'the British Isles. DAIRY PRODUCE AND MEAT.

The season had commenced well so far as dairy produce vas concerned, and he believed blio prices were going to last at ""“e for this year. One thing that would help to keep them up was tho )’r r y large number of people going to the Exhibition. It was the same with meat, but he did not include beef in that. He referred to the fact that, while our meat was very good, he had found when he visited SnuthfleJd with representatives of the New Zealand Meat Board that the salesmen were not verv pleased with the comparison of our moat with that of other countries so far as its get-up was concerned. The wrappings of the meat were too often sailed and untidy looking, and many of the carsases showed cuts, which should not he. It was true that he had struck Smithfield at a had time for the old season s meat from New Zealand was still in the market, and new meat was coming from other countries; but we must maintain the reputation of our meat, and the matters he had referred to ought to be. looked to.

NEW ZEALAND EGG® AND BACON. He congratulated the New Zealand poultrymen on the success of the two shipments this season of half a million eggs apiece. Only two ot the eggs had been broken, and there was not an unsound eigg in the lot; while the poultrymen had got a better price than they could have got here. It was a splendid thing, ajid the people responsible for it were deserving of all credit. The head of a big catering firm in London had said that he would take all they could sqnd if they were of the same quality. While this was a comparatively email matter, Mr Massey considered that it showed tho value of protection. The importation of Asiatic eggs had been absolutely prohibited hero; and instead of there being a shortage of eggs. a« many hod predicted, the supply tik&d gmickly exceeded tho local demand, and we had had to seek outside markets. Another matter lie wanted to deal with was the question of bacon. For a long time there had been trouble with tho bacon trade in New Zealand, but there was a market for an UTilimited Amount of bacon at Smithfield. He had befcn shown tons and tons of American bacon there, and it could

loot compare with New Zealand bacon for quality; and a great deal of excellent I bacon was imported from Denmark and ' Holland. So that there wan a good market for the benefit of our producers, and ■ for the benefit of our people as a whole; for the money that came back here for our produce filtered down to everyone in the Dominion. DEPRESSION AT HOME. It was, added Mr Massey, a matter for great regret to him that while we were prosperous here, and they wore prosperous m other dominions, though not so prosperous us New Zealand, the only British country that was not prosperous was BriPart of the business of the Conference had been to devise measures to .lift the depression existing in England; and, since that depression affected the purchasing-power of the people there, I VS? U ?* : . a ® us * What was the cause ol that depression? he asked. He put it down to the fact that Britain still adhered to froe trade, though tho conditions were different to-day from what they were some sixty years ago when free trade was first established there. Britam wis no longer the leading workshop J*. t "f world. America was, and Brfbud to face, too, the competition of tile Continental countries with their depreciated currencies, which were paying lor the goods they manufactured in their own depreciated currencies, but selling them for good British currency, and thus making vast fortunes. He had seen beautiful razors made in Germany sold in Britain at Is apiece, and German fieJdSlasses sold at ?5s a pair. They could! not be made for the money or anything j**? H j y et the British people sat* quiet and said nothing. Ho was afraid that ?? h M lVed , there and a-few men whol thought oa ho did they would make them hear about it, even if they could not bring about a change. (Applause.) Tho result vas that the broad was being taken out of the British worker's mouth, and out of the mouths of hie family. A SIMPLES REMEDY. There it wag; and to his mind it was as simple as anything could possibly 'be; and who*! the difficulty between France Germany was settled tho competition would be keener than ever, though he would he very glad to see that difficulty biought to an end. That was the position of Britain now, and if the new Go. vernment at Home would tackle it he would give tho Ministry every credit for it. But they didn’t do it at the election. Mr Massey strongly contended that the British Empire should he self-supporting, and that to that end Britain should have projection, and there should be Imperial preference. That might lead to free trade between the different? British countries, ,l>ut that "would take a long time, and there were many problems to be solved in regard to the encouragement ox local industries, etc., before it could bo considered. Supposing we let Australian goods and produce in free, bnt Australia put a tariff of 25 per cent, on all our exports, what -would we say to that? he demanded. But that was what was called free trade at Home. He maintained that that was not what Cobden and those associated with him meant iby free trade; sixty years ago; and it had turned out, ho believed, a perfect curse, not only to the people in Britain, bnt to the people in the overseas dominions too (Loud applause.) The Empire could not he so strong nor so united as it ought to l«, he contended, so long as that state of affairs continued. (Loud applause.) A verse of the National Anthem closed, ee it had begun, the proceedings.