MOTHER COUNTRY.

Taranaki Daily News, 30 April 1917, Page 5

MOTHER COUNTRY.

THE PREMIER HONORED. A STIRRING SPEECH. FOOD AND SHIPPING' PROBLEMS. WHAT IS BEING DONE. London, April 27. There was a distinguished assemblage at tho Guildhall on the occasion of the presentation of the Freedom of the City to Mr. Lloyd George. All the Dominions' and Indian representatives were present, also Lords Curzon and Milner, Mr. Henderson, and numerous peers and members of the House of Commons.

The Premier, who had a great reception, began his speech by emphasising the growing British superiority over tin Germans. In June, 1915, he said, we had lost eighty-four guns and a considerable number of prisoners, but since, then we had not lost a single gun, and we had captured four hundred, while we had taken ten Germans for every Britisher they had taken. Vimy Ridge, with two hundred guns, was captured with a fifth of the loss sustained by the French in the early days, when they had inferior equipment. All this meant ultimate victory at less cost than the -Germans sustained. He would not say that the war would last through 1918, but they were taking no risks, hence the necessity for immediately increased cultivation and elaborate food measures. The future of the country depended upon how much politicians had learned. The Empire must be consulted in future before war, not during war, and the Council of the Empire must become a leality. "Our victory," continued Mr. Lloyd Geor.ge, "is becoming increasingly assured. Subrnarinism is the worßt problem we have to meet to make the seas absolutely impassable for any craft. That iB essential to victory for them and it is essential to victory for us that they should fail. Do not let VJ9 minimise the gravity of the situation, for unless we appreciate it we cannot meet it. This problem has worried us for the last 2 J years. At first the German? themselves did riot realise the potency of the submarine weapon, hut latterly'they have concentrated on building submarines. Since the Germans determined to sink all craft indiscriminately they have sunk more ships, but they have brought America in, and I am perfectly satisfied with the balance. America at length saw it was useless waving a neutral flag in the face of a shark. The best brains of the Allies are applied to the submarine problem. It would be unwise to say more at present, but, believe me, we are concentrating on this problem. I have never seen an insoluble human problem, and I do not believe this is an exception."

Mr. Lloyd George outlined the steps taken by the Government departments to deal with the food problem. Ho said farmers were now cultivating ten per cent, more land than before the war. The farmer had been- given a guarantee and so had his laborers, and after the feverish activity of the last few montns we had millions of acres of fresh land under cultivation, meaning an additional two million tons of food. "I am not going to say that the war will continue through 1918, but we must take no chances. We have already taken far too many. If the German knows that by holding out until the end of 1918 he can win by starving us he will hold out, but he also knows that the longer he holds out the worse it will be for him. Hence peace might come much earlier. We are taking steps now for the harvest of 1918 and not a minute too soon. Three million fresh acres of land are being put into cultivation and even without a ton of food bedng brought from abroad no one can starve. But all must help. You must save your rations and. keep to them. The kitchen must help as well as the workshop and the trenches."

THE DANGER OF DELAY.

"If," added the Premier, "those steps for cultivation had been taken a year or eighteen months ago, we should have had no danger about food now. We might not have had enougli wheat, but there would have been other cereals."

Turning to shipping, Mr Lloyd George said the cutting down of imports last year was not adequate. In addition to the saving of 1£ million tons last year, the new arrangements were now working to stop an additional six million tons of imports. Arrangements were being mads whereby, ultimately, imports would be cut down by over ten million tons yearly without interfering with any essential industry. Furthermore, we are going to save all our timber; we are making arrangements whereby we can get most of our minerals worked in the mines of Great Britain; we shall be getting four million tons of ore in addition to what we are getting now out of this country, and by August next our blast furnaces' will be adapted for that purpose. You know what ten million tons of imports 'mean. If this had been Haved a year ago there would now have, been a year's supply of wheat stored in this country. ; THE OCEAN BACILLUS. A. and N.Z. Cable Assn. and Reuter. Received April 28, 5.6 p.m. London, April 27. I Continuing, Mr. Lloyd George said: "There are eighty-five million bushels of wheat available in Canada, I cannot say for the asking, but for the fetch, ing. It ought to have been here, but { believe about twenty or thirty million bushels thereof had to go to the Unite! States for lack of other markets. W« must cut down food until we discover l method of destroying this ocean bacillus. That is one thing which has to be done, but it is not all. We are building ships, and the shipping controller has already made arrangements whereby we will liav'q thrice, and possibly four times, as manv new ships in 1917 as last year.

A. & .N.Z. Cable Association and Reuter.

Received April 29, 5.5 p.m. '

Mr Lloyd George added: "The Shin, ping Controller has nlso brought pra*. tically the whole of the shipping of tM country for the first time under cow, plete control and requisition. That means that the ships of this country are to be concentrated henceforth upon tho essential and vital trade of the-' country. The Shipping Controller has so concentrated and arranged the traffic that, although we are losing heavily in ships, and assuming that wo still continue to loso at the same rate, in July wo shall bring more cargo tonnage into .our norta than we did in March-laßi,

THE OLD COUNTRY WILL -WIS | THKOUGH, I "The Germans th-ouglit we were floni 1 ,, but they did not l-aiow the ruce they were dealing with. When pressure is brought to 'bear on ■this old country it somehow or other wins through, and it is going to do it this time, ; by the means I have mentioned. I have 110 hesitation, after duly investigating the Government, reports and looking at the whole thing in its worst, as well as its hest, aspects, in saying that if the programme is carried out, which means that everybody in the country does -his or her duty, the German submarine campaign is beaten, but the public must stick to rations, the farmers and laborers must cultivate the land, and the workmen in the shipyards and the manufacturers must do their best to increase the supply of slups. Wl3 CAX DEFY THE VERY WORST. 'lf we carry out all those things faithfully, we can defy the very worst." Mr Lloyd George proceeded to say that he had dealt at length on this submarine question because it had undoubtedly attracted a great deal of attention and the figures were alarming, hut the Government had published them al)|, because they wanted the public to know. The present Government concealed nothing from the public.

"Britain,', lie said, "is a country you don't get the best out of until it knows the worst. That is true of any country with grit. We sent 100,000 men to France in August, 1914, and they turned the tide of history. The Dominions and India contributed a million men; that has transformed our ideas regarding the jeality of the beneficence of the British Empire. The world cannot afford to let it be broken, but the choice must be between immediate concentration and ultimate dissolution. Things Kaaiont remain where they were. It may 'be said that the shadowy character of the relations between us, the Dominions and the great territories of the East produced this real cohesion. That was all very well before they made their sacrifices. They have now established claims to a real partnership, and henceforth effective consultation must be the only basis of co-operation. If our action (brings them into trouble, as it has, and costs them millions of previous lives, they must henceforth be consulted before we act, and our methods must Ibe carefully considered. During the great war is not the best time for thinking out, perhaps, new constitutions, but our counsels of -Empire must bo a reality. The Imperial War Cabinet has been a demonstration of the value of this counsel. Our colleagues from the Dominions and India have not taken part in a formal conference, but they have had a real share in our counsels and our decisions, and have been a great source of strength and wisdom to our deliberations. We decided that in future it is to be the business of British and Dominion statesmanship to knit the Empire into closer bonds of interest in trade, commerce, Business, mineral production, and intercourse in our affairs. We considered this problem, and decided that in order to develop these enormoua territories in the future, it will be nece«Bary that exceptional encouragement should be given to the products of each part of the Empire. We believe a system of preference could be established not involving the imposition of food burden*; for we jbelieve we can do without that. , IMPERIAL PREFERENCE. GENERALLY WELCOMED. > PRESS COMMENTS. Received April 29, 5.5 p.m. London, April 28. The newspapers, generally, welcome the announcement that Cabinet lhas adopted Imperial preference. The Morning Post regrets that .the decision does not include foodstuffs. The Daily Mail says the change has been long and ardently desired, but the fateful decision has now been made. The Daily News says that Mr Lloyd George is unlikely to ibe more successful in avoiding food taxes in connection with colonial preference than was -Mr Chamberlain. The Daily Chronicle regrets that such a highly contentious question should be dealt with till after the war, a-s any alteration in the fiscal policy would be unfair to the Allies. The Daily Telegraph considers that the Government's decision will bo welcomed far and wide throughout the .Empire. ■STATE SUBSIDY Kffi LMERS. Received April -2D,-11.30 p.m. London, April 29. There was no meeting of the Imperial Conference to-day. City circles anticipate that one result of the preference decision will probably be State subsidies for steamship lines to assist the development of Empire resources. ■FEDERAL' PREMIER'S COMMENTS. Received April 29, 11.5 p.m. Melbourne, April 29. Mr Hughes, commenting on the Imperial Conference's preference decision, saiil that Imperial preference had been part of Australia's policy for years. Presumably, the Conference's decision meant that Britain intended to give preference I to Australia. EXPLOSION AT MUNITION FACTORY. Received April 29, 5.5 p.m. London, April 28. The Press Bureau states that a sixinch shell exploded in a munition works in Scotland, injuring a man and 11 women, three of tb« latter succumbing. No material damage wi3 done. EXPLOSION AT MUNITION FACTORY. London, April 27. The Press Bureau states that a firo and a small explosion occurred in a munition factory in the North of England this morning, one man being killed and four injured.