THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER: 1, 1930. MARKING TIME.

Wairarapa Age, 1 November 1930, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER: 1, 1930. MARKING TIME.

For nearly a month the Imperial: Conference has been in session, in London and a good many .people must be wondering how many more conferences of the kind' the British Empire can afford to have if it is to remain an Empire—this, of course, in: the modern sense of a- partnership of free countries. The principal business before the Conference is that of economic co-operation; Efforts that have been ma'de to suggest that constitutional: questions- should; be regard L ed: as claiming the lion’s share of attention on this occasion are quite unconvincing;. The Conference and its committees have given a good deal of time to the discussion of constitutional affairs and when everything is over it will no doubt appear that some elaborate constitution-mongering has been carried out, ibut this is to a great extent besfde the point. It seems fairly safe, to say that if the countries, of the British Empire are able to combine in building up an economic policy for their common and mutual' benefit, no constitutienal issue of any importance will be likely to arise within the Empire or in reference to the Empire’s relations with foreign nations..

The .success or failure of this Conference must be measured by its treatment of economic affairs and at the late stage that has been reaehed, the outibok is not promising. From the economic viewpoint, the principal results of the Conference to date are a series of negatives. It seems impossible to find any tangible justification for the cheerful generality in which the Prime Minister of Australia, Mr. Scullin, declared the other ‘day that: “The Imperial Conference of 1930, in Hid economic sphere, ha'd given a splendid impetus to closer Empire economic co-operation.” A nearer approach to realities is made in Mr. Beullin’s further observation: “It will remain for some subsequent discussion to evolve the precise measures.” The actual position at the moment seems to be that the British Government has decisively turned down the Dominions’ tariff preference proposals and that the Dominions have on the whole looked very coldly on the British Government’s alternative proposals. A much more effective impetus to 'discussion than the one Mr. Bcuilin talks about evidently is needed if ’ 1 Empire economic co-operation ’ ’ is to become more than a meaningless phrase.

What is needed was stated fairly well, though rather vaguely, by Mr. Forbes when he said that the .countries of the Empire should seek mutual arrangements voluntarily, freely and spontaneously made for the advantage of the whole family. Tariffs and tariff preferences need not be by any means the only or even the most important elements in arrangements of this kind. The proposed economic secretariat might, for Instance, yield immensely valuable results if it were turned to account, as Sir Oswald Mosley suggests it might be, in allocating production between the different parts of the Empire—that is to say, in enabling the countries of the Empire to agree amongst themselves, on a basis of ascertained fact, as to the industries they should each develop or leave to others. Planned development on these lines is just as much opposed to free trade principles as are preferential and other tariffs and so long as free traders hold office in Britain, the machinery of an economic secretariat, if it is set up, may prove to be of little practical value. The outstanding result of the present Conference may be to demonstrate the need for continuity in the practical discussion of Imperial affairs. Meetings in Lon-

don, separated by an uncertain interval of years, evidently are not enough. It becomes definitely a question of seeing what can be accomplished between Conferences, not merely in ventilating subjects of discussion, but in getting results.