PRESS OPINIONS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 5 September 1913, Page 4

PRESS OPINIONS.

The reform of public works expenditure will be a largo task, and it will take time, for it is involved with the problem of local government reform. Any thoroughgoing reform will, of course, be resisted by suoh members as those who have so bitterly resisted the Civil Service reform which has ended their business of obtaining billits for their constituents in return for votes. —Christclvurch Press.

Britain's influence in the world has not diminished, and it is gjod to hear from those who are in a position to know, and who do not speak wthout a sense of responsibility, that the British Flag is still the emblem of a nation whose powers are undiminished, and for whom the future promises more than the past.—Southland Times; .

Australia is'.working methodically to a definite end, but Canada and New Zealand do not know what tlieirOwn positions are in relation to • the: naval defence of the Empire, though in our own case there may be a little comfort for some'people in the knowledge that the Hon. James Allen is nursing a scheme of his own. ,We hope that he will reveal it fully before he and Mr Massey make any arrangements to represent the Dominion at an Imperial Conference.—Lyttelton Times.

There is every argument in favour of the policy which proposes to contribute and depend upon the Imperial Navy, though the subscription we at present make wiH require to be raised. Mr Allen's few remarks indicated that he now sees eye to eye with Sir Joseph Ward. That he has not always done so on this question does not matter. It is not a party question. Men who wocld make it a party question, as in Canada, are better out of Parliament. —Manawatu Times.