AUSTRALIAN STATES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3996, 14 October 1930, Page 7

AUSTRALIAN STATES.

COMMONWEALTH FEDERATION,

GROWTH OF SECESSION FEELING,

, AUCKLAND, October 6. “ If Tasmania followed her inclinations she. would be joined politically and economically to New Zealand rather than to the Australian mainland.” remark'd Mr \\. H. Cummins, general manager of the Hobart Mercury, who is returning from the Empire Press Conference in London, on his arrival by the Aorangi. “It is now generally recognised,” Lie said, * that there is a more reasonable attitude towards the conditions of o-ov-ernment in New Zealand than obtains in Australia, which las beei. governed too long in the interests of the two large cities, Sydney and Melbourne. The remaining States of the Commonwealth have suffered accordingly.''

Mr Cummins believes that if any one of the Australian States seceded from the Commonwealth, Tasmania would follow suit. “ They seem to be very earnest about secession in Western Australia,” he said. “ I have no doubt that if a sufficient number of people in that State persist they will succeed in breaking aw altogether from the Commonwealth, and that will mean the break up of the federation. A breach can only be made, of by unconstitutional methods—by the refusal, for instance, of one Star*to pay the Federal taxes. Such a course would create a crisis, and it would then remain to be seer whether the Commonwealth Government would try to enforce the Federal laws. No attempt would be made, I am sure, to hold a State in the federation by the sword. The temperament of the Australian people would be utterly against that.”