HOME RULE

Otago Witness, Issue 3018, 17 January 1912, Page 26

HOME RULE

THE FINANCIAL ASPECT.

LONDON, January 11

At the Royal Economic Society's Congress a number of papers on the financial aspects of Home Rule were read. The authors generally demanded fiscal independence for Ireland. Lord Mac Donnell, who presided, declared that fiscal autonomy was attainable without connoting the possibility of serious danger to Britain. He suggested, in order to ascertain the Irish revenue, the establishment of a Customs organisation at the Irish ports, Britain making good the differences to which Ireland was entitled under the Act of Union. The Irish Government should be obliged to make economies or impose additional taxation for Imperial objects. He was opposed to the withdrawal of the Irish represen' tatives from Westminster. January 12. Mr J. Robertson, M.P., speaking at the National Liberal Club, said he was a Home Ruler, but also a Federalist. If Ireland were given fiscal autonomy a federal system would be impossible, because there was no saying what the tarimtes would do with a clear field.

ENVOY'S TOUR IN VICTORIA. MELBOURNE, January 15. The Irish envoys have concluded their Victorian tour. They collected £6OOO, making a grand Australasian total of £22,000.