IMPERIAL PREFERENCE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 2707, 11 January 1910, Page 5

IMPERIAL PREFERENCE.

IMPRESSIVE SPEECH BY AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN.

Unitkd Puksh Association—CopruiuiiT. (Received January 10, 9.3 S p.m.) LONDON, Jan' 10. Mr. Austen Chamberlain, speaking at East Birmingham, said: “The selfgoverning dominions have not been discouraged by the Liberals’ derision of their efforts of preference. Britain alone hangs back, but she cannot postpone- the decision indefinitely. If we allow our leaders to discourage commercial union by describing it as a squalid bond; if we allow ill-mannered under-secretaries to slam the door in the face of tlio representatives of our kinsmen overseas, the time will come when we shall be knocking at a shut door. The dominions will not come as suppliants. If Britain refuses the proffered advantages, other suitors are ready to woo. Italy, Belgium, and Germany are seeking the closer relations which Canada has granted to France. If we remain blind to their material interests and force our kinsmen to make commercial treaties with foreign countries, one by one these treaties will limit the scope of any possible preference, and may end in weaving closer their commercial interests with foreign countries than with the Motherland.” Mr. Chamberlain quoted Mr. Lloyd-George’s speech at the Colonial Conference, whe’rein the latter stated that the excuse' for refusing the colonial offers was the poverty of -a large proportion of the British people. Mr. Austen Chamberlain replied that Britain’s colonial kinsmen asked for no sacrifice. New markets for British products, more work, and fairer terras for British labor were the surest remedies for poverty and unemployment.