THE IMPERIAL TRADE COMMISSION.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1407, 6 April 1912, Page 4

THE IMPERIAL TRADE COMMISSION.

The late Prime Minister, as the accumulation of cases long ago brought us all to understand, used to consider as his private affair the communications between his Government and the Colonial Office. Agtiin and again, when an important decision was arrived at affecting Now Zealand and the other dominions, or an important paper issued !>y the Home Government for the information of the oversea peoples, we in New Zealand have had to depend, for light upon such matters, on those other Prime Ministers who took a less exclusively arrogant view of the rights of their office and a broader view of the rights of the nation. So, in the matter of New Zealand's representative upon the Imperial Commission on Trade, we have had to wait for our information until after the publication in London of the fact that Sib Joseph Ward has been appointed. The reticence of the "Liberal" leaders has been sharply in contrast with the frankness of the Canadian and Australian Governments. It is apparently not yet decided—at any rate it was not mentioned in the statement' made in the House of Commons—when and where the Commission will commence operations; but action is certain quickly 'to follow the settlement of the Commission personnel. As might have been expected, some of the London newspapers are expressing dissatisfaction with the delegates selected by the Home authorities, and although there is a strong Tariff Reform flavour aboiit the objections, it is certainly surprising that men of such great weight and ability as Lord Grey and Lord Balfour of Burleigh have been overlooked. But there was never yet a cricket team or a Royal; Commission above the reach of" criticism, and in the present case there is this consolation for honest critics, that the matter the Commission will have to handle will be stronger than the Commission itself. It was expected by nobody that a Commission could be appointed which would establish for all time a set of fiscal truths for the management of the Empire. The Commission, whatever it may recommend in its report, will have gathered together by the time it has completed its labours a mass of facts and figures that will enable us all for the first time to obtain a general view of the Empire as a commercial world.

So far as the New Zealand delegate is concerned, we are bound to say that Sin Joseph Ward is not particularly well equipped for the work -jeforc him. He is a keen business man, and he has acquired a considerable knowledge of finance from his long practice in piling up otir national debt. He is, moreover, a practical politician of a kind. But we are afraid that ho has no great knowledge of the pathology of trade and industry. He has not had time to acquire the art—for it is an art —of the practical economist. A man may spend a lifetime in the practical politics of a raw, young country and yet bo helpless to understand tho science of trade and industry, just as a man may be a lifelong accountant and yet be as ignorant of mathematics aB a child." Sir John Findlay, on the other hand, whilo ho has often expressed views on economic questions which we believe to be quite unsound, has jjust the port of mind that would be of real value on such a Commission. The choice, however, is made, and after all the New Zealand representative is not the vital unit. For New Zcalanders the chief interest iri Sir Joseph Ward's appointment is in the bearing it is likely to have upon our politics. Upon this point the member for Awarua has made ; a statement that nearly everyone will find extremely puzzling. His appointment, he says, "will not interfere with his position as a member of the House of Representatives." "It is not my intention," he added, "as a result of the appointment to retire from public life in New Zealand." Perhaps he will make clear in due course, what is certainly not clear now, how he can travel about the Empire continuously for two years, most of which will be spent in other parts than Npw Zealand, and still occupy a seat in the House. Of course, his continuance in politics does not % depend entirely upon himself. There arc external factors in the shapo of voters and ballot-boxes which limit the ability of any public man, great and small, to declare with exactitude what he will do in politics. Whilo Sir Joseph AVard , s statement cannot in the least degree affect the main political fact, which is that "Liberalism" is done for, it will fill our "Liberal" friends with varying feelings. A great many of them will conclude that his undertaking to remain in the ship is merely due to his desire not too suddenly to blight any hopes they may cherish concerning his usefulness to the party.