BRITAN'S PREMIER.

Hokitika Guardian, 27 January 1917, Page 1

BRITAN'S PREMIER.

An Interview. (Australian & N.Zi. Cable Assoc. ami Keutv. r), LONDON, Jan. 25. Mr. Lloyd George, interviewed ny a correspondent of the Lnitccr Ca bio Service regarding the Ira .dr .1 \t.< r Council, said he had urgently invited .the Dominions’ Premiers because he desired their advice and assistance in the coming decisions on the conduct of the war and negotiations for peace.

He regarded the Council as the oeginning of a new epoch in the history of the Empire. The war had changed us and taught us more yet understand. It opened a new age for us and wc want to go into that age together with our fellows from Overseas.

This was quite fair, because they had gone through the darkness and shed their blood and treasure together, so that nothing affecting the Dominions in the conduct of the war and the negotiations for peace should be excluded from their purview.

The Council meetings on domestic matters affecting tlio United Kingdom would bo the only reservation.

Replying to the question whether the discussion would .include uie fate oi the German colonies, Mr Lloyd George said that that was ono obvious question but there were many questions of equal moment, all to be thrashed out. The War Policy of the Empire would be daily defined,, besides the after the war questions, such as demobilisation, emigratiin of our people to different parts of the Empire, the settlement of soldiers on the land, commerce ana industry.

In reply to another question Mr Lloyd George said he could not hesitate to break precedent at such a time, as trie Empire was throwing its very soul into the war, and he would be failing in his duty if ho did not take every possible step to see that its leaders get together from time to time.

LONDON, Jan. 25. It seemed to him an impossible and undemocratic proposition to think that the Overseas nations should raise and place in the field armies containing an enormous; proportion of their best manhood, and not want to liavo a leal say in determining wliate use they are being put to. For that reason ono of the first acts of tlio neiv Government was to asK wie Overseas’ Premiere to attend, not a formal Imperial Conference, but to sit on the Executive of the Cabinet. The Empire Conference should sit now if possibleavhile the war was non won, and work in concert with our efforts to exert the maximum strengui at the critical moment.

Further, wo arc most anxious that during the last and most trying phase of the war our Empire may present to the world an absolutely united from*.

The British Government in prosecuting the war to a finish, or negotiating peace, w'aiits to know if it could be carrying out the policy agreed upon by the atepresentiatiJves of the Empire sitting with the plenary Council. We stand on the verge of the greatest liberation the world lias ever seen since the French Revolution. “Do you tell me that the people who stood together and .staked JiteraSiy everything to secure liberation are not going to find some way of perpetuating that unity afterwards on an equal basis?

“I ifm certain that the peoples of the Empire will found such a unity upon this war as they never wished before.

I am certain that nations which have borne the heat and burdens of the day in overthrowing militarism will take a leading share in building that new earth which is made possible by their sacrifice.”