MR LANG’S POLICY ENDORSED.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 18823, 11 March 1931, Page 9

MR LANG’S POLICY ENDORSED.

Position in New South’ Wales. FEDERAL TREASURER CENSURED. United Press Association—Bv Electrlo Telegraph —Coprrlght SYDNEY, March 10. By 26 to 5 votes, a special meeting of the Dailey Electorate Council carried a vote of no-confidence in the Federal Treasurer, Mr E. G. Theodore. The meeting decided to support the policy of the State Premier, Mr J. T. Lang, in the East Sydney by-election, and congratulated him on his financial policy. Mr Theodore, in a fighting speech, made a bitter attack on Mr Lang. (Mr Theodore represents the Dailey constitutency in the Federal House of Representatives. J THE PEOPLE NOT POWERLESS. CAN THE GOVERNOR SUPERSEDH MR LANG? (The Sydney Bulletin.) “Of this the people can be assured. The Australian Labour movement would not permit for one moment any of its leaders to be associated with a policy of repudiation. The Labour Party sets its face against all repudiation.”—J. T. Lang, in his policy speech at Auburn, September 22. At the Premiers’ conference (Canberra, February 9), the same J. T. Lang proposed: (1) “That the Governments of Australia decide to pay no further. interest to British bondholders until Britain has dealt with the Australian overseas debts in the same manner as she has settled her own foreign debt with America. (2) That in Australia, interest on all Government borrowings be reduced to 3 per cent.” He added: “The Government of New South Wales has decided to adopt this policy where it applies, regardless of what the decision at this table might be.” In the New South Wales Parliament on Tuesday this loan drunkard of other days—as Treasurer in 1920-21 and 1925-27 he borrowed forty millions—repeated that the “policy” outlined at Canberra was the “policy” of his Government. In the same Parliament on Wednesday the dominant mob, which lied its way to the Treasury benches, refused to allow the “policy” to be discussed. Must New South Wales then suffer the shame and disaster of being posted as a defaulter? Happily the crime can be prevented. It will not even be attempted (though, of course, the mere threat that it will be has done untold harm) if the Scullidores rise to the occasion.

The debts on which it is proposed to default amounted on June 30 to £270.908,000. They are not now cax>trolled by the State; with the enthusiastic approbation of the people of New South Wales (the voting was 754,446 for and 415,846 against) they have been transferred to the Commonwealth by virtue of an agreement which has been validated by both parties, and is now Commonwealth law and State law. It is provided in section 105 of the Commonwealth Constitution Act that “the State shall indemnify the Commonwealth in respect of the debts taken over”; in section 5 that "all laws made by the Parliament of the Commonwealth under the Constitution shall be binding on the Courts, Judges and people of every State and of every part of the Commonwealth, notwithstanding anything in the law’s of any State”; in section 109 that “when the law of a State is inconsistent with the law of the Commonwealth the latter shall prevail.” If the Scullidores permit Lang to carry out his threat, the Constitution Act becomes waste paper, and the Commonwealth will break up; and, weak as they have shown themselves in other matters, Federal Ministers are surely not as craven as all that. But whatever the Scullidores may do or suffer there is still the Governor of New South Wales to be reckoned with. This gentleman has “great powers” (the words are those of the “Year Book” “published by authority of the Government of New South Wales”), and so has the Imperial Parliament. Indeed, “the Imperial Parliament is legally omnipotent in local as well as Imperial affairs, and it may exercise effective control over the affairs of the State by direct legislation, and some indirect control through the Secretary of State for the Colonies, by whom the Governor is directed . . . Where Imperial interests are involved the prerogative powers of the Crown are exercised through the Privy Council, the Secretary of State for the Colonies and the Governor”; and those interests are certainly involved when the Government of New South Wales threatens to refuse payment of interest to its British creditors. For the rest, the Governor may, if he sees fit, “act in opposition to the opinion of his Ministers, reporting the matter to the Secretary of State for the Dominions”; he may reserve or refuse to assent to bills passed by the Legislature; he is “guardian of the Constitution, and bound to see that the great powers with which he is entrusted are not used otherwise than In the public interest”: “in extreme cases his discretion constitutes a safeguard against malpractices.” An extreme case has clearly arisen. The rights and interests of the people of New South Wales and the fair fame of their Federal State are in jeopardy, and their will, as expressed at the State Debts referendum, is to be flouted. They will rejoice if the Governor dismisses his present advisers and entrusts the leader of the late Goverment with the duty of securing the people’s considered opinion on default—as the “Year Book” puts it, “he still possesses important spheres of independent action such as granting dissolution of Parliament.”