The Daily News TUESDAY, JANUARY 17, 1905. MR CARRUTHERS ON HELP FROM NEW ZEALAND.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 7714, 17 January 1905, Page 2

The Daily News TUESDAY, JANUARY 17, 1905. MR CARRUTHERS ON HELP FROM NEW ZEALAND.

In connection with the late hush-fires in New South Wales it will be recollected that Mr Seddon promptly cabled a suggestion that halp for the sufferers might be obtained in this colony, and that Mr Carruthers, the New South Wales Premier, has promptly replied to' the effect that the 'damage done was not beyond home resources for relief. We have lately learned by cable that Mr Carruthcrs has been taken to task for this refusal of our assistance, and has explained his action by saying that he. did not wish his State to "appear to Ire a beggar for charity from outside sources," Without questioning that, as Premier of the oldest and most populous State of the Commonwealth, Mr Carruthcrs has a right jealously to guard its reputation, we think that he has taken a wrong view. The relationship and mutual responsibilities of these colonies are such that in accepting proffered aid from one another in timo of sudden 'distress no question of mendicity can rightly be raised. Furthermore, in the official recognition of outside contributions, Mr Carruthcrs would not have made any new departure. More than once the Government of India has permitted help from the Empire at large to reach its native population in time of famine. A few years back Queensland accepted relief from this colony for the sufferers of great floods, and more recently still Cami. da welcomed a substantial money vote from our Government in aid of those who had lost by the Ottawa conflagration. There is, therefore, abundant proof that the practice of mutual help among the different Stales of our Empire is not rcgarded as making those who accept appear beggars in tho eyes of the world. We do not wish to deny that any State has a right to refuse outside aid for its people, but merely to point out that where the need is urgent, and the aid would be of material value, such a refusal need never be returned on the grounds advanced by the Premier of New South Wales. To assist one another in time of distress is one way in which tho communities which make up our great Empire may freely evince their sense of brotherhood and mutual goodwill. That they should do so is not so much a matter of charity as of family duty, and for this reason we think that any official restraint on the good offices which we are disposed to render ono another is mistaken policy. It must be granted of course that we have a right to thrust ourselves into our neighbour's affairs, but we <lo not think (hat the immediate sufferers from any great disaster would look upon relief from outside sources as less acceptable than that . coming from their own fellow-citizens. Any Government action tending to chill that warm friendship between the different States of the -Empire which prompts the stretching out of the brotherly hand with .something in it is bad statesmanship. Whether in time of trouble relief flow east or west across the Tasman Sea there can never be talk of "• beggars.'-' Brothers we are in FJmpire,origin, and heart, and it Is sincerely to -lie hoped that the day will never come when wo shall regard each' other's misfortunes with cold indifference.