MOTHER ENGLAND

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLII, Issue 20513, 3 September 1936, Page 11

MOTHER ENGLAND

SAFETY VALVE OF WORLD Bv Telegraph—Prw Association WELLINGTON, September 2. “In two years and three months’ time the people will have an opportunity of saying we have not fulfilled the political aims we said we would, and they can say to us: ‘Farewell; you are done as far as we are concerned,’ ” said the Minister of Transport (Hon. R. Semple), replying to the toast of the Government at a social function. “But the people might also say: ‘Well done thou good and faithful servants; go back and step on it,’ ”Mr Semple continued. “I can say this with a smile,” he said, “for no matter what the judgment, we will accept it with dignity and grace.” Mr Semple said he did not intend to discuss party politics. Although they had differences along political lines, they all agree that with all their faults and failings, our political institutions in the British Commonwealth of Nations arc far ahead of any other form of government in the known world. When they looked out at the state of the world to-day, they must come to the conclusion that those who are.living within the four corners of the British Commonwealth ought to be thankful that they were British citizens. They had seen overnight the political liberties of nations snatched away, and their religious liberty challenged. They had witnessed a form of despotism and slavery reign supreme. "When people talk to me about some other country, I ask them, in turn, who in this country would swap the New Zealand form of Government for the Russian form—who would swap our rights and privileges for the system which obtains in Germany, Spain, Italy, or any of those countries? Mother England to-day is the sheet anchor of democracy, and the safety valve of the world. We have got to hold fast to those traditions that are sacred to the heart of every British subject.”