THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1927. VISITORS FROM BRITAIN.

Wairarapa Age, 21 February 1927, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1927. VISITORS FROM BRITAIN.

Ono of to-day’s cablegrams mentions the possibility .that the Secretary of State for the Dominions (Mr. Amery) may bo able to visit New Zealand and other Dominions in the near future. Such a visit would be an acceptable sequel to the tour of the Dominion about to be made by Their Royal Highnesses. the Duke and Ijuchess of York. The Royal visit will be welcomed by New Zealanders as an opportunity of demonstrating their loyal regard for tho Throne as a strong Jink of Empire. Though it would stand in a somewhat different category, a visit by the Secretary for the Dominions would also be of great importance and value. Actual contact in this country with the member of the British Cabinet to whom is delegated the vitally important duty of keeping touch with the Dominions might-be expected to quicken and stimulate in a number of ways the spirit of inter-imperial co-operation.

No one is more convinced than Mr. Amery of the scope that exists within the British Empire for political and economic co-operation. He is keenly intent on fostering Empire tride and on forwarding the development of the Empire by an effective mobilisation aud use, from the broadest standpoint, of British national resources. It cannot be doubted that a visit to the Dominions would strengthen his hands immensely and increase very considerably his influence as an advocate of co-oper-ation between the Mother Country and the Dominions in oversea development. It is one of the most obvious conditions of success in this vast national enterprise that British Ministers should be better equipped than most of them are to-day with first-hand knowledge of conditions in the Dominions. Mr. Amery has a fuller knowledge of the Dominions than most of his colleagues, but it is many years since he last visited Australia and New Zealand, and there is no doubt that he would be assisted greatly in the discharge of his present onerous duties if he were enabled once again to visit these countries and discuss on the spot their problems of development. When a tour of the Empire by the Secretary for the Dominions was last mooted, difficulties arose, and the project had to be postponed. It is to be hoped that this will not occur again There is much to be said for the view that the Secretary for the Dominions cannot be better employed than in

touring the overseas Empire, and that every Minister taking up this responsible position should be expected as a matter of official routine to spend a portion of his time in office in studying conditions in the Dominions at first hand. Regularly undertaken, visits of this kind would make for a considerable enlightenment of British Parliamentary and public opinion in regard to questions of inter-imperial trad'? and development. They would do something also to ma-dify the difficulties arising out of the fact that meetings of the Imperia! Conference are necessarily somewhat infrequent.