CLEARING FOR ACTION

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 85, 7 October 1931, Page 8

CLEARING FOR ACTION

Mr. Stanley Hirst, in his presidential address to the Labour Party Conference at Scarborough, declares that "a tariff is unthinkable," but the fact that a thing is unthinkable is no ! security against its happening. Twenty years ago the increased expenditure on the Navy to which even a Liberal' Government was being driven by the Kaiser's policy was denounced by -the Labour Party on the ground that war with Germany was "unthinkable," but to-day even the most advanced of Labour's historians would hardly deny that this unthinkable happened. More unthinkable things than a tariff have happened in Great Britain before now, and one of them has happened this week. A week ago it was generally believed that a dissolution was imminent, and that the tariff would be the dominant issue at the General Election. But it was plainly ! unthinkable that the Cabinet would decide in favour of an immediate appeal to the country upon the tariff issue without having made up its mind at any rate on the general character of the tariff, especially in relation to such thorny questions as the taxation of food and Imperial preference. But all the speculation on the subject has been unilluminaled by any authoritative expression of Ministerial opinion,-and if we are to take yesterday's report of the Cabinet's decision at its face value, the: unthinkable has now happened. Cabinet has declared for a tariff election without knowing what sort of a tariff it is to be, and "Conservatives and Liberals and Socialists have already begun to write their election addresses" in the same state of darkness. The terms of the message announcing the Cabinet's decision are as follows: — Cabinet unanimously decided on an immediate General Election. The Prime Minister, Mr. Kamsay Mac Donald, was given a free hand to formulate an election manifesto. Cabinet's decision was unanimous. We had previously been told that Cabinet was considering the idea of appealing to the country "as a National Government without any programme," and of asking for a free haiid to deal with the crisis, neithor specifying nor excluding any particular measure. If the Government is to appeal to the electors for a free hand, and not knowing what use it would like to make of it, is giving the Prime Minister a free hand to draw the appeal, Mr. Henderson and his friends may be able to argue very plausibly that even more unthinkable things are happening than a tariff. A National Government, being unable to define its policy, has, they will say, decided to appeal to the country for a blank cheque, and if the appeal succeeds it will not even have the energy to fill the cheque in for itself. That little detail will be left to the Prime Minister. Like Shakespeare's Jack Cade, Mr. Mac Donald will be able to say, My mouth shall be the Parliament of England. Such things would certainly be said by the Labour Party in the- event supposed, but we may reasonably hope that the event will not be quite so unthinkable as yesterday's report suggests. There must surely be some limitations to the vagueness of the mandate—if we should not rather say the vagueness of the licence—for which Mr. Mac Donald proposes to .ask. According to one of yesterday's reports the Liberals in the Cabinet —which must probably have meant "in the Ministry," since it was on the Ministers outside the Cabinet that the fears of a split were based —had been given a time limit within which to gay "Yes" or "No," and that any dissentient would be opposed by a National Government candidate. It may be hoped that unanimity was attained without any such ugly ultimatum, but it appears to be beyond question that it has been attained, and that there will be no Liberal resignations. As to the manifesto, the latest word is that it is "not expected to contain a definite tariff pledge," but it is still possible that there may be some limitation, and that the margin of uncertainly may result in Conservative-Liberal clashes in the constituencies even though they have been suppressed in the Government. In ihese encounters the Liberals would usually have a poor chance against the Conservatives, but the victory of a Labour candidate through

llie splitting of the opposing vole is a risk against which it is hoped to provide by arbitration. tJ But .while leaving the nature oi llie tariff pledge still in doubt, today's news is of great importance from the evidence it supplies of the spirit in which the Labour men in —the National Government will figlil the election. Mr. Mac Donald has been invited to contest both Gateshead and Sunderland, but though neither of these electorates would be such a hornets' nest as his present constituency, and in Sunderland he could hardly fail to win, he has decided lo stick to Seaham. I remain a Labour member, he says, and fight as a Labour candidate. And he prefers lo fight as a Labour candidate in the constituency where the Labour Party has declared war against him and decided to run another candidate. In the same spirit Mr. J. H. Thomas has refused to' sever his long association with Derby at the dictation of the local Labour Party, When Mr. Thomas severed his still longer association with the National Union of Railwaymen his only comment was: "I have resigned rather than be dismissed," and the tears were streaming down his face. But Mr. Thomas's tears were no more a slur upon his valour than were those of a Homeric hero in the days when tears were less unfashionable. He now shows himself a worthy colleague of Mr. MacDonald by saying that ho would fight Derby even though he had to break down the machine he personally created. Mr. Snowden's iron resolution would have made such a decision still easier for him if his health had permitted, but everybody will be thankful that he will now find rest in the House of Lords.