The Daily News. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1911. DOES BRITAIN CARE?

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 116, 6 November 1911, Page 4

The Daily News. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1911. DOES BRITAIN CARE?

At the moment Europe is fidgeting nervously and is watching with painful anxiety the flight of the war eagles. First the little cloud in Morocco, portentous enough to people crowded in Europe and knowing that should war come the continent that lias been so often rent with red conflict would again be torn with a concussion that meant that every man. woman and child would he penalised. Next the Italo-Turk-ish conflict and the eagles are nearer. Britain is always represented as not caring. She does not care because she is insular. War does not come to her, her towns are not shelled, marauding armies do not pillage her great cities and her peaceful villages, and —the women and children do not know whal war means. ]n Europe it is different. Frederick Annesley has some thoughts about, Ihe situation and puts them plainly, to show why the women of Eourope eare. Says lie: "liritain has no fronlier.s in the Continental sense. For hundreds of miles Germany and France have not a hedge or a five-barred gate to hinder the crash of arms! When the Rhine is negotiated the forces of France and Germany will be at each other's throats instanter. Forty years ago Slrassburg and Melz fell within six weeks; and Prussia had taken from France her two garden provinces. War is a hloodv affair on the frontiers of France and Germany. Nowhere in the world is it as terrible. Alsace and Loraine and the Rhine provinces are the graves of millions of brave men. Yes, it's 'rotten for the mothers' just now!

But in England nobody sems to | care. Surrounded by our streak ] of ocean we can sleep like tops o' night, while over the water every mother of a soldier boy is on her knees to the Blessed Virgin beseeching protection for her son when he finds himself in 'battle's maknificently stern array.' We know nothing of war in Britain. A Coronation procession is the nearest thing 'the mothers' ever get to it. Lots of swagger troops —scrubbed, burnished and pipeclayed into 'heroes'—with the glorious jangle of a hundred bands—beautiful sights with soulstirring sounds —but that's all we know of war in Britain. But the mothers of Germany and France have no silly illusions about war. They are brought up to know all about it. In their cradles the children of the frontier villages are frightened out of their tears with threats of 'the Germans' or 'the Frenchmen,' just as children in this country are frightened by threats of 'the bogey man.' Every family in France can boast one I of its members who has fallen for the tri-color. A hundred years ago Napoleon put almost every man and woman in France into mourning. Since then the process has been repeated. And forty years of internal peace has not perceptibly dimmed French appreciation of the horrors of war [ in a country with a flat frontier. No wonder our own best general (Sir John French) reviewed the French troops at Nancy! Or that Belgium is putting right its fortresses at Liege, Namur and Ostend. Or that the Kaiser is reviewing the German-fleet at Kiel." New Zealand's "splendid isolation" and her comparative insignificance are her best protectors. By the time she becomes a striking figure maybe the horrors that Europe now fear will have passed away with the rest of the barbarities. These are the matters that agitate newspapers into asking why Yon Kiderlen-Wachter (the "imitation Bismarck"), Jules Cambon and de Seeves have not hurried up negotiations about the j Moroccan dispute. Let us have news, even if we have blood with it! Reflections on the possibility of an European conflict in which I any frontier may see the passage of troops and peaceful citizens be plunged into the horrors of carnage, may give the New Zealand-' er the comfort that he is far from the arena of great events or even events of second or third import- ; arice. Britain has to thank her i insularity for the immunity she | enjoys from the horrors that are j the nightmare of every citizen in j Europe.

MR. lIIXE'S ADDRESS,

IJr. Ilinc has every reason to be gratified with the warmth of the reception he wet with at Stratford on Friday night. -All were pleased to see him about again after his illness, and entering the lists with his aeeustomed spirit and energy. The candidate, in acknowledging the kindness that had been extended to 'liini during hi.s illness, mentioned that apart, from politics be 1 did not think he had a foe; .but it does not necessarily follow that bwausc a man, especially a public man. has foes his worth is' detracted from. On the contrary, the mum of individuality, of strength of purpose and conviction, frequently makes enemies, and a good many of them, but he is none the worse—probably he is the better—for their existence. Mr. Hine's address was much on the line of those of Mr. Mas-ey and other Oppositionist luminaries, to which we have been treated of late. He bad little or nothing new to add. Criticism of the Government, their sins of commission and omission, there was, aa was to be expected, in plenty, and, on the other side, there was painted, of course, in the most brautjiful colors, tho programmo the "reformers" are going to set in operation as soon as their long deferred turn of power comes about. He set out by criticising the constitution of the Cabinet, and in this connection quoted some views of supporters of the Government on the Cabinet, but lie did not quote the same members' views on the Opposition, and an Opposition Cabinet. He might til have: they would have been illuminating. Their frank criticism of the Cabinet;, as a matter of fact, is but a refutation of tho charges so frequently made by Mr. 1 line and his Party that tile rank and tile supporting the present administration are "servile followers," "dumb dogs," ami all the rest of it. They have quite as much independence and courage as the men in the Opposition camp, ami speak their minds quite as freely. All with the interests of tire country at heart, distinct from the interests of party, fully realise that the Cabinet needs strengthening and new arid vigorous blood introduced. That it needs replacing altogether, however, the country has yet to be convinced. With all its present defects the administration has a record of work performed that will stand the most searching analysis. Mistakes have been made; the Government lias gone too far in some respects, and not far enough in others. It could ■hardly lie otherwise, for the Government which has not made mistakes at some period or other of its career has not made anything worth having. In the l>a*t the Opposition lias done .little to assist the Government in placing the useful measures that stand to its'credit 011 the Statute Book. Its policy lias to n very large extent been one of negation. Members of the ''Reform" Party talk of what they will do. for instance, in assisting land settlement: yet when the Advances to Settlers Hill, one of the most, beneficial on the Statute l!ook, was before the House Mr. Ma-sev voted at its diU'crenl stages sixteen times against it. and Mr. .Tames Allen eighteen, and they were equally emphatic in their disapproval of the Land for Settlement Bill and other measures that had for their object the assisting of the small men 011 to the land. Messrs. Massev. Allen & Co. now pose as being the real friends of the farmer, especially the struggling tanner, and delight ill representing, or misrepresenting. the party in power as the farmers- hereditary enemy, ready to take advantage of him at. every turn! Actions, however, speak louder than word-. Mr. Hi ire glihl.v talks of what his I'art.v will do in helping settlement, but the Acts already passed and in contemplation by the Government (as expressed in tho latest Land Bill) are quito aa far-reaching, if not more so.. He would have electors believe that !bis

Party stand unanimous for the freehold, whilst the Government • stand for the leasehold, which is quite untrue. The Government are offering optional tenures, and the freehold ean be obtained if it is dewked, except in the ease of endowment 'lands, the revenue from which is hypothecated- to education and old age pensions. There are men with strong leasehold views, men who do not believe in parting with another acre of the public estate, in both parties. Happily they are in a minority, but to infer, as some of the Opposition do. that the Government are more favorably disposed towards the leasehold than the freehold as a tenuro 'is wilful misrepresentation. Tho option system is the best system; it is what the country wants, ami it is what it is getting. Mr. Hlne complained of the hasty legislation methods, and we concur in his view that a more rational system is urgently needed. At the same time his own side, it should be pointed out, are just as big offenders as the other in wasting the time of the country. The cutting out of the Ad-dress-in-Reply and the exercise of the closure would help matters a good deal, as would the adoption of the suggestion that the Government think out all Bills during the recess and have them circulated to members at the beginning of Parliament. -Mr. H-ine' repeated the old cry about the country being plunged into debt, and "trotted out" the usual gag about that six and a half million loan, conveniently forgetting to tell his hearers what it was wanted for, namely, to pay for the Manawatu Railway and the Dreadnought, and to provide money to lend out to local bodies, farmers and workers. The taxation, of course, is. in hie jaundiced view, crushing the lifeblood out of the country, which, as a matter of fact, was never an a more prosperous condition; and he was equally wide of the mark awl irresponsible in many of his other observations. He gave out that the "Hine charges" had been proved, a statement which would probably surprise even his greatest supporters, who know that the charges missed by miles their main objective, namefly, fastening on the Government the proof of wholesale charges of ''Tammanyism." Mr. Bine promised to "electrify the House and the country," and he was at pains to establish the point that the Government, as w-ell a.s members of Parliament, past and present, were implicated in his charges. "Now," he said in Parliament, "I would like to make it clear that there da an imputation lodged at the door of the Government. The Government must therefore be implicated. There is no doubt about it." What was the -result? So far from the country being "electrified'' by proofs of corruption and other misconduct, the reputation of the Seddon and Ward Governments came out unscathod. The imputations of impropriety on the part of Minj isters, 'past and present, were entirely i disproved. Some of the minor charges, reflecting on the integrity of past and I present members of the House, were, it I is true, proved; hut these matters were known to most people before the enquiry i began. For instance, Mr. Ifine fought and won last election on what resolved itself into an issue of malpractice. To this extent Mr. Hine was successful, and if he is satisfied 'he accomplished his purpose by proving what was practically known beforehand few will feel disposed to quarrel with him, but the outstanding and salient point of the enquiry, that of proving "Tammamyism" 'or bribery ard corruption against the Government, ho signally failed to establish. That he had the courage of his convictions, of feeling that thcro was something wrong ami setting himself the task of proving tho alleged wrongdoing, we must acknowledge, but he would have shown a greater regard for his political reputation l>y sifting things more anil obtaining the necessary evidence before -he brought charges that were going to "startle tho country." Mr. Hine, we notice, had something to say in regard to the West C'-oast leases. The Taranaki members, or rather Messrs. Dive, Okev and Pearce, wanted a clause inserted in the Native Land Claims Act Adjustment Act giving West Coast settlement lessees perpetual right of renewal.. The Native Minister offered to set up a commission to go into the whole question of these lesi/ses. The Taranaki members, how- ' ever, did not accept the offer. In this refusal of tho offer wo consider the Taranaki members were ill-advised. Tn our references to the subject we expressed 110 opinion as to the merits or demerits of the lessees' ease, or of the nominal native owners'. Wo only want to see the fair thing done by the respective parties. The position is considerably involved. Mr. Iline says he did not support the other Taranaki members in their desire to get the clause they wanted in the Bill. We don't blame him for that. To -our mind he took the right course. Before such a right is given, the whole matter should be thoroughly gifted by a qualified tribunal, such as a commission the Minister expressed his willingness to set up, but which offer Messrs. Dive, Okev and Pearce failed to embrace. There are other points in Mr. Hin-u's address that may be profitably discussed, but we must leave him for the time being, and only desire now to congratulate 'him on the straightforward and able way in which he put his case, to commend the honesty of purpose marking his political life, and to express the hope that the election campaign so "cleanly," if resolutely, begun by both contestants will thus continue till polling dav.