Great Britain

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIV, Issue 20, 29 December 1915, Page 5

Great Britain

. THE BRBTJSH CABINET. A POLITICAL CRISIS. RECONSTRUCTION OF PORTFOLIOS IN THE A! R. United Brush association. (Received 9.40 a.m.) London, December 28. The Cabinet held a two-hours’ sitting yesterday, and a historic; meeting is expected to-day. The general impression of the newspapers is that the division in the Cabinet really concerns conscription, while the matter of The treatment of unattested single men is relatively a subsidiary one. The Daily Telegraph states: There are indications that the Cabinet is divided over the question of compulsion and voluntarism. Resignations may occur, and even a general election may be resolved upon. The Daily Chronicle deplores the fact that political wirepullers are contemplating the desperate expedient of a. general election, which is a gambler’s plunge. The •cream of the voters are in the army, and no issue is before the electors. Mr Asquith is bound to keep his pledge to the married men; • but there is not.the smallest need to rush precipitately into compulsion. That is the way where discord and disunion lie. The Daily Mail says; Mr Balfour resolutely: opposes compulsion', and also does Mr Arthur Henderson, while Mr Bonar Daw and Lord Kitchener do not stand in an attitude definitely apart from these and Mr Lloyd George. The Cabinet is divided on Liberal and Unionist lines. Mr Asquith desires to keep his pledge strictly, but as uniformity of opinion was unattainable, the Cabinet adjourned. On to-day’s meeting depend the coiitinuance of the Government and the possibility of a general election.

Tjio Morning Post says: The matter is properly cine for the generals, who alone know the real requirements. The decision .rests with Mr Asquith, hut; Whatever he ressolves the Cabinet will certainly be reconstructed. VOLUNTARISM , V- CONSCRIPTION London, December 27. The political .situation is rapidly assuming, a crisis. A section of the Ministers are demanding a fortnight’s extension of' Lord Derby’s scheme, hoping that the unenlisted unmarried men will then be a negligible quantity. ■ It is believed that the discontents include Sir Edward Grey, Lord Crewe, Mr Iluncifruui, Lord Buckmaster, Mr McKenna, Sir John Simon, Mr Birred. Mr McKinnon Wood, Mr Harcourt-, ahd Mr'Henderson. The conscriptionists, are Messrs Bonar Law, Lloyd George, Lord Curzoii, and Lent Selborne, and the position is undecided. Mr Balfour and Mr Bonar Law declared that general elections at present are unthinkable,' hut a large section is defiiiiMy working' for : an appeal to the country, arguing that it would ednckte 'itlie public to the war situation, and bring in sufficient new men down the corrupt , > k. party system. Colonel Repington says that when Mr- Asquith announces the results of Lord Derby’s scheme he will define tlie Government’s policy, by which we shall know whether the Cabinet proposes to win or lose the war. Lord Derby’s pledge to the married men and a long list of reserved trades occupations makes it doubtful whether even compulsion will give us the needed men. ■ i

THE ROAD TO EGYPT. London, December 27. A Rome correspondent learns that German engineers .have, suspended the construction of the railway to Egypt owing to the lack of material. Thej had now forced ten thousand laborers, mostly Christians, to build a wide macadamised road for the remainder of the distance. The recent Senussi raids across‘the Cyrenaica border are not regarded as of importance. The British are strongly guarding the. caravan routes. ' The Daily Mail states that Mr Lloyd George insists upon compulsion of the Unmarried men, and that ho threatens to resign unless Mr Asquith’s pledge is renewed.