INTERVIEW WITH MR. DEAKIN.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXII, Issue 8836, 12 June 1907, Page 2

INTERVIEW WITH MR. DEAKIN.

Dissatisfied as Usualpress Association—Copyright, Sydney, Juno 12. The following interview with Mr Deakin in England lias boon telegraphed from Fremantle. Dealing with the attinde of the Imperial Government Mr Deakin says: “I think Ministers acted consistently but ar■rued throughout inconsistently. They absolutely refused any and every kind of fiscal preference either on -their existing tariff or by any modification of it. In that direction there was no thoroughfare but they suggested that in regard to modes of preference other than fiscal they had an open mind. They invited propositions of any character, although they refrained from making any themselves yet when I submitted a general suggestion for the purpose of producing a basis which might lead to some definite arrangement it was attacked in a most, contentious spirit and dealt with in its details iu spite of my repeated protest at the time that details were matters of indifference and that Ministers were evading the real purpose of the proposal. What I sought was practical action and a resolution necessary to allow such action to ho taken. The outcome was that they offered but I declined a general and indefinite resolution in favour of some such action being taken hereafter at some indefinite time.” Mr Deakin instanced the case of Sir W. Laurier’s mail service proposal which was met, ho said, certainly with less aggressiveness hue with almost equally determined opposition. Sir W. Lanricr was obliged to consent to his motion being whittled down before ho could secure its acceptance. There was little prosnect now of Sir J. Ward’s desire for a rapid Pacific service receiving anything like adequate support from the British Government. The total practical results of endeavours to acsertaiu forms of co-operation other than fiscal preference to which the Imperial Government was willing to agree was nil. It would have been more consistent if Ministers with a mandate against preference had given their decision at the outset of the conference. We were not iu effect at the close of the argument with a plain nou-possumus quite irrespective of the merits of the discussion or in fact of any discussion we could have maintained. Except therefore as a dialectic exercise for Ministers the whole debate so far as they were concerned was rendered as meaningless as had all j,been decided beforehand, decided for them as much as by them. While therefore they were practically consistent iu refusing to accept other proposals they were quite inconsistent when they encouraged us to pursue the argument at great length without a prospect of our arguments leading to anything.