THE COLONIAL CONFERENCE.

Timaru Herald, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 12911, 28 February 1906, Page 2

THE COLONIAL CONFERENCE.

A significant amiuunecnunt as to -the Government's attitude with tegard to the Colonial Conference was made by Mr Winston Churchill, Under-Secretary tor the Colonies, in the- course of a speech in North-west Manchester on January 4th.

At the Colonial Office, he said, Lord I Elgin was faced with many difficulties, | but the question of the Colonial Conference presented no difficulties to the Government. The periodic assembly of representative men from all parts of the British Empire to discuss questions of Imperial interest was attended by great advantages, and such a policy would receive aU possible assistance and encouragement from Lord Elgin. Before Mr Lyttelton left office be had with, great propriety suggested the postponement to 1907 of the conference due to assemble in the summer of this year, and inquiries had already been sent to the various colonies concerned before the Government changed. It appeared that the postponement of the conleieuce to the year 1907 was in several cases actually convenient to the Colonial Ministers themselves, and fitted in more happily with their own electoral arrangements. Moreover, all who had the interests of the British Empire at heart, whether at' home or in the coknifs, would desire that these periodic conferences should be kept absolutely clear from British party passions, which were always excited by ;•. General Election. When the conference met in. ISO 7 it would, of course, be f:ee and unfettered. It would be open to Colonial Ministeis to bring forward any question or. to advance any proposal which seemed to afford a prospect of a more intimate co-ordination and closer union of the various widespread dependencies of the Crown. If the result of the General Election should provide Sir Heniy Campbell-Ban-nerman with an adequate "majority for the conduct of public affairs, it would be the duty of the representatives of the British Government to inform their colonial colleagues that we could not enter into any arrangement for a preferential union with the colonies involving the taxation of food. That would be one of the issues of the election. In making such a statement, Liberal Ministers would only he following the course taken by Mr Chamberlain, who at the Conference "in 1897 proved conclusively to the colonial delegates Trow injurious a system of colonial preference would be to the permanent interests of the British Empire. Nothing but advantage could possibly follow from a free and friendly discussion and a frank exposition of the insuperable difficulties with which the question was atteuded. There were, moreover, many other questions of Imperial importance lying altogether outside the realm of fiscal reform upon which a colonial conference would throw most instructive light, and in regard to which His Majesty's Government were hopeful of fruitful results.