NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1362, 13 February 1912, Page 4

NOTES OF THE DAY.

It is interesting to remember, in connection with Mn. Churchill's speech in Belfast, and especially his quotation of his father, that in his biography of Loud Randolph, Mk. Churchill has to make many references to Ireland. Lord Randolph delivered a notable speech in Birmingham on the Irish question in 1889, and in describing it his son accidentally mentions the too little remembered fact that the best thing that has happened to Ireland in modern times has been the work of the Unionists.

"Ireland," says Mr. Churchill, "was the principal theme. For the first timo on this subject since he resigned he unburdened ins mind without restraint. He showed how much he hated the harsh and ill-tempered opinions , then so powerful. Me advocated two sreat measures by which Hie Conservative party might with wisilom and propriety assuage the bitter discontent of the Irish people—local government and land purchase. He even named the sum of money for which the credit of the United Kingdom might be pledged to create a peasant proprietary. 'Something like one hundred millions,' he said, and the audience gasped suspiciously. What folly to think the Conservative party would touch such measures! And yet they have passed them into law." Lord Randolph took up an attitude the reverse of that now taken by his son. It is curious to come upon a passage like this in the biography:

Concessions lo Ireland made by any British Government which depends for its existence on tho Irish vote will naturally and necessarily be suspect. There must always be a feeling in Kiiglish minds that such a Government is- net n free agent, that it is trafficking for personal or party advantage with ivhat belongs to the nation. In 1880 Mr. Gladstone's Administration lay under deep suspicion.

Gladstone as is well known, always held that it would be perilous to Britain and to the Empire for a Government dependent on the Irish vote to proceed with a settlement of the Irish question.

As a result clue, no doubt, to the lingering influence of the so sadly mistaken dispatches from Hew Zealand during the election campaign, the English papers which have occasion to refer to the political situation in this country snow themselves to be rather puzzled. The one fact that is clear to them is that the reign of "Liberalism" is at an end. Their speculations are of no account now, when we are on the very eve of a settling-lip. Notice ought to be given, however, to a quaint suggestion in The Standard of Empire. Tho writer says:

Kemeinbaring that in the past New Zealand has shown ilself exceedingly broadminded^—oven daring and speculative—in legislative experimenting, I wonder the pominion does not choose this stage of its carper, as the opportunity, which it undoubtedly is, of giving the Empire a lesson in non-party government. Why should not Mr. Jlassey and Sir Joseph Ward call a round-table, conference of their ablest followers; form a Ministry drawn equally from both sides, and proceed to the administration of New Zealand's affairs, without reference to party, nnd with the single aim of scrying the Dominion's best interests as efficiently as thev can be served? Why not?

Of course, such an arrangement might satisfy the followers of Sir Joseph Ward, but it would not satisfy the Reform party in the country, vhicli insists upon its policy being carried out from top to bottom. And Sir Joseph Ward is not precisely fitted to help in carrying it out." Non-party government, however, is not possible even in New Zealand.

The present docs not appear to he just the best time for asking organised labour either here or in AusIralia to recognise how useful industrial co-operation can be. Yet v/e may risk a short reference to the distribution of dividends of the CoPartnership Trust in Messiss. Levkk Bkotiieus on New Year's Day. This completed the third year of the Trust. In the first year certificates in thi! Trust were issued to th? amount of £98,H53, on which 7 per cent was paid in dividends. The next year the certificates amounted to £186,702, and the dividends, at 1C per cent, to £13,070. For 1911 the dividend was again at the rale of ]0 per cent, on certificates amounting to £-298, 1' M. In his address Sin Wh.uam Lever said some very interesting things. The Hoard of Trade returns showed (hat. profitsharing schemes lasted only five yours on the average, and if this Trust, ivns to succeed, they should all understand the scheme. Industry could lint, rcuiJly (itiroend. ho held, ij.?t!r,r.i, employers and employed were both

fair and honest, and especially unless the idea were sot rid of that the interests of master and man were opposed because they were different. The conclusion of his speech, which contains some sound truths, even (■hough there are turns of phrase thai will repel complete agreement willi the whole, argument, was as follows:—

The pro<ont crude ifhitions liplwctn capital and inborn- must (,'ive way In dip sciciu-p (if ciliics founded upon i, 'brotliprJiood bused mi nli'wtion. In an armv. nripinispd fur war. wliiltt a skirmish coul.l i>l lon bo won when I In- private mldiiM-s disliked (heir officers, no lon-,' raiiipaij-n could be won without ;t mutual nllectiou anil fpelimr of sympathy. That nllfc-timi was founded utimi conli'donoe in the oflirei>-, nnd they wanted tlie same confidence bplwivn employers and cinplnyocs in induslry. They had to lind out why that fwliiiff of 'affection was absent from industry. Jt might be that the employer took (on much ami the employee too little. Let them try then to introduce a saner way of lookin? Nt things. The leader of industry onjjnt to have tho same spirit, as the captain of a ship, who was the last to save, his own life in a time of disaster, but that spirit could only be introduced into industry on the same basis on which it existed oil board ship or in a regiment. He believed that great combinations of masters and powerful unions of men would play nn increasingly large part in the future of industry. They could be very powerful, but at the same time they coiild be very small and iiwan. Management, he thought, could only succeed in winning consent and ready help of its ompioyees on the lines of co-partnership, and it whs for them, as co-parfaiers, to say whether productive enterprise could b'u carried on with brotherhood and alfection and with mutual confidence.