Great Britain

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 74, 30 March 1915, Page 5

Great Britain

IMPERIAL CONFERENCE.

MINISTERS OBSCURING THE ISSUE.

Times and Sydney Sun Service. (Received 5.35 p.m.) Loudon, March. 29. The Times, in a leader, says: Our correspondent justly points out that the Colonial Secretary, Mr L. V. Har-

conrt’s reply, that he considered it undesirable to hold a normal meeting of the Imperial Conference in 1915, is calculated to give the maximum gratuitous offence to Australia. Mr Fisher never suggested a normal meeting of the conference, but urged that the Dominion Ministers should meet in consultation in London. It is an amazing instance of tactless blundering on the 4>art of Mr Harcourt, who too often allowed himself to fail in his dealings with the Dominion Ministers. The war has revealed with startling clearness one essential fact in the gelations between the Dominions and Britain, viz., that they have no voice in the issues of peace or war. Our Statesmen for years have been occupied in obscuring this fact. They have, by a constant stream of reassuring platitudes to the Dominions, told them they are masters of -their own house, that they are units in a greater unity—and so thdy are—but that when there is one supreme issue before the Empire they can have no voice in the decision, which is made for them, and that by it the ymust abide or sever their* membership as a British community. This is a hard saying, and cuts like a sword through the soft network of illusions which have been woven to obscure the truth, about the limitations of selfgovernment in the Dominions. We only say with Lord Milner that a consultation will obviate misunderstanding and grievance. If the Government is blind to this, they won’t summon Ministers ; if not they will ask them to eome to London.

FORMATION OF AN INDUSTRIAL RESERVE IN ENGLAND. (Received 8.55 a.m.) London, March 29. An industrial reserve is being formed for men of leisure working in ammunition arid other factories, wherever their services are acceptable, to assist in relieving ordinary workers of the strain where possible. They will be paid the market rate. The dockers at Swansea accepted a war bonus representing a fifteen per cent, advance.

The steel; workers at Dowlais (Glamorganshire) and Workington (Cumberland) also receive bonuses. The bonuses system is spreading.

AFTER-DINNER SPEECHES.

COMMONWEALTH’S PART

“AN ASSURANCE TO ALL THE WORLD."

(Received noon.) London, Mar :li 24

At a luncheon to the Hon. F, W. Young (South Australia’s Commissioner of Lands and Immigration) at the Cannon Street Hotel, eighty people were present, including the High Commissionei the Agents-General, bankers and business men.

Sir George Reid, proposing the toast of Mr Young, said the Commonwealth’s despatch of troops was an assn anefi to all the world that there was no geographical limit to the vigor of our race, and that no ocean and no distance would destroy our myalty. Mr Young said that South Australia was never better able to meet the adverse conditions of the drought than they were ito-day. “Though times are bad for our people,” he said, “it is good that we realise the Empire is at stake. It is that which has prompted all the Government’s to proffer victory to the Empire and the Allies.” He hoped that when making peace terms every means would be taken i-o consult the Dominions and so preserve amity between the Motherland and the outlying parts of the Empire.

THE RULES OF WARFARE.

London, March 29

Mr, Balfour has drawn up a statement for circulation in the United States. He points out that the Allies’ blockade policy - was in accordance with the spirit of international law, and was less injurious to neutrals than a strict blockade. It does not kill a single civilian, and cannot destroy neutral* property. If Britain violates the letter of international law by discriminating between Scandinavia and the United States this is not due to the policy, but to a geographical accident. Replying to those who say that the crime of one party does not justify the other in modifying nis policy, Mr Balfour points out that this is confusing international morality with law, the obligations of which are conditional upon observance by both parties; if otherwise, the rules of warfare would load the dice in favor of the unscrupulous.