ALL SAFEGUARDS GONE

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18265, 7 December 1933, Page 7

ALL SAFEGUARDS GONE

IRISH TREATY BREACHES DISCUSSION IN LORDS BRITAIN HOPES FOR PEACE (British Official Wireless.) Rec. Noon. RUGBY, Dec. 6 The Irish question was raised in the House of Lords by Lord Danesfort, who asked what action was to be taken to protect the undoubted rights of British subjects to appeal to the Privy Council. lie declared that the recent Irish Free State legislation forbidding such an appeal was a breach of the treaty. Lord Carson, who is in poor health, and now rarely attends the House of Lords, received a sympathetic hearing. He said the oath had gone, and other promised safeguards had been abolished from time to time. Now, the last remaining safeguard—appeal to the Privy Council -had gone. He urged the Government to reconsider the whole question. Lord Hailshnni, replying, said the debate was rendered important by Ihe intervention of Lord Carson, to whom lie paid a warm, tribute. It was an unenviable position for any member of a Government to reply to criticisms which he could only sav were undoubted ly justified. With regard to a series of nt (ions which he could make no attempt to defend, the Government consistently had taken the view that under the terms of what was called the Irish Treaty, it was not competent for the Free State Government, without the refutation of honorable obligations and the disregard of the terms to which it had set its signature, unilaterally to abrogate the right of petition for special leave to appeal to His Majesty in. Privy Council. MUST PACK ELECTORS Thelv had been a long series of legal decisions which laid it down that the right of the subject to petition His Majesty for special leave to appeal could not be taken away by an enactment by a Legislature of a Dominion without the express authority of tin Imperial Statute. As the validity and effect of the Free State Statute might he raised for judicial deterininatiqii'Tpy the Privy Council, it would the improper for him to suggest that, he had even an opinion about it. In the absence if a decision to the contrary, the Government did not propose to recognise the action taken in breach of the treaty' rights. lie believed that there were in the Free State a very large number of people who were full of Irish honor, and anxious to see the obligations undertaken by them observed. The British Government profoundly regretted any divergence of opinion between the Government of the Free State and itself on any of the interests between the two countries. The interests of both were best; served by the closest association. A Sun Service message from Dublin dates that everyone is most disappointed that Mr Re Valera and Mr Thomas in their 'correspondence have iot advanced a settlement, which, it is felt, is long overdue. A continuance of uncertainty can only result in bankruptcy and chaos. It is considered that Mr De Valera must shortly face tin 1 electors on the Republican issue in order to retain his power. COUNTRY BLEEDS TO DEATH Lobby opinion considers the Government reply to Air. He Valera to be adroit, and characterised by moderation and good sense, particularly ip refusing to be drawn into a hypothetical discussion. 'J'iie Daily Telegraph’s Dublin correspondent says: “Had Mr. Thomas declared that Britain would meet the establishment of a republic with aggressive action, Mr. De Valera would have appealed to the -country, and an election might well have gone in his favor. A high authority assures me that an election is now unlikely.” While Mr. De Valera is still balancing with one leg within the Empire and one outside, the country bleeds to death economically, 't he Free State lives in a hypothetical republic. Her people’s citizenship of the Empire is also hypothetical. The only thing not hypothetical is the collapse of trade and the certainty of an increase in taxation, leading to doubts whether the Free State will return Mr. De Valera when lie risks an election. Mr. De Valera, replying to a deputation protesting against the sentence on 12 Republicans for attacking General O’Duffy, said that the Free State was in the midst of a grave crisis, due to another country’s aggression. Every act of disorder incited aggressors and tended to discredit the Free State abroad.