The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1929. THE OPTIONAL CLAUSE.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 225, 23 September 1929, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo.

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1929. THE OPTIONAL CLAUSE.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the wrong that needs resistant*, For the future in the distance, And the good that toe can do.

On Friday the Prime Minister was able to announce to the House that New Zealand had signed the famous optional clause in the protocol of the International Court of Justice. The clause was signed at the same time by the representatives of Britain, South Africa and India, subject to certain reservations. The representatives of Australia and Canada have not yet received instructions from their Government as to the course that they are to follow, but Sir J. Ward has intimated that they will probably sign on the same terms. The British Empire has thus in effect bound itself to utilise the facilities for the settlement of international disputes provided bv the Permanent Court.

Naturally the precise conditions on which Britain and the Dominions have agreed to sign are an important feature in the situation. All questions of "domestic jurisdiction," and also all inter-Dominion disputes are specifically excluded. The reservation referring to domestic jurisdiction is, of course, meant to cover such questions as Immigration, which Japan and other Powers have endeavoured to bring within the purview of the League of Nations. Further, it is stipulated that the proceedings of the Court may be suspended in any dispute for not more than twelve months, if it should be found desirable to submit the matter under discussion to the Council of the League. Under these conditions our acceptance of the "optional clause," which is to hold good for a period of ten years, seems to be adequately safeguarded.

Now that all the conditions and circumstances are before the public, it must bo generally agreed that the Prime Minister followed tho only possible course in declining to discuss the matter in Parliament last week. It would have been highly injudicious to embarrass the Imperial authorities at a critical moment in their handling of this delicate problem. This is one of the occasions on which a government must act decisively and must be prepared to accept full responsibility for its action later on. We agree with those members of the House who hold that the whole matter should be discussed by Parliament, and if the majority of members then find reason to be dissatisfied with the way in which the Government has discharged the trust committed to its care they will have their remedy.

EXTREMISTS FALL OUT. The average reader of newspapers may bo excused if he is bewildered by the number of grades in the left Aving of the Labour movement in Britain. Indeed, the colours in the whole movement range from a pale pink to a fiery red. To most Britons Mr. James Maxton, M.P. for the Bridgeton division of Glasgow, is a "Red." Working with an honesty and sincerity that inspire respect among opponents, Air. Maxton heads straight for "Socialism in our time," and has already warned Mr. Ramsay Mac Donald that ho must hurry in the same direction if he wishes to rely upon the support of the 200 members who wear the I.L.P. ticket. But Mr. Maxton does not go fast enough for some of tho left-wingers. He has belonged to the British section- of the League Against Imperialism, an Empire-wrecking body whom Mr. Mac Donald recently was obliged to rebuke. Now the League has expelled Mr. Maxton because he was not extreme enough in his attitude towards Egypt and Palestine. Apparently the League wished the British Government to stand aside while the Arabs massacred the Jews. The League, however, is running true to type. Such organisations nearly always tend to be extremely intolerant and to expel the more moderate element. Possibly Mr. Maxton's views about the Empire have broadened a little since he entered Parliament, and in some quarters this would mark him as a traitor and an outcast.

A DANGEROUS PEST. The annual report of the- State Forest Service once more draws attention to the injuries inflicted on the native forests and plantations of the Dominion by the depredations of deer. These animals have now become a veritable pest, and the damage that they have done to our indigenous and exotic flora is already almost incalculable. Several years ago it was officially estimated that there were 300,000 deer in this country, and the harm that they did to our forests was then estimated at £200,000 a year. Since then vigorous efforts have been made at thinning out the herds. But the methods of destruction have certainly not kept pace with the natural increase, as evidenced by the degeneration of the herds and spread of malformation among them. "There is no doubt," says this year's Forestry Report, "that deer constitute the most serious menace to the State-owned forests," the danger being evidenced in the fact that "in consequence of their great numbers the forest floor has in many places been completely despoiled." This means that through the complete transformation in ecological conditions the possibility of perpetuating either native or imported forest trees by natural regeneration has disappeared. The Forestry Report further points out that, by destroying the sub-alpine flora above the bush-line, the deer are directly promoting the spread of shingle-slides and landslips and the recurrence of floods. The natural remedy is to plant trees anew along the head-waters oE the rivers, but the deer eat them out as fast as they are planted. This pest, says the Ferestry Report, has attained such dimensions that it is quite beyond the control of the acclimatisation societies, which, by the way, were primarily responsible for it. "It is now a national problem, and should be nationally controlled." Here certainly is a public duty that Parliament cannot safely neglcft much longer.