Manawatu Evening Standard. FRIDAY, JULY 30, 1937. PREMIER’S RETURN.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 204, 30 July 1937, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. FRIDAY, JULY 30, 1937. PREMIER’S RETURN.

A spontaneous welcome was accorded the Prime Minister on his return from the Mother Country where he represented New Zealand at Ihe Coronation of King George VI. and subsequently at the Imperial Conference. The period he spent in England was a busy one indeed, and one may well understand the pleasure Mr Savage feels in being once again back in this Dominion. Furthermore, it was a time of somewhat acute international tension which was reflected in the political situation in Europe, the British Government’s decision to embark upon a huge rearmament expenditure, and the instability of certain markets until confidence returned. Ilis experience in attending his first Imperial Conference Mr Savage has found to be most interesting and most valuable, but he gathered the feeling of “some reluctance (on the part of delegates) to approach realities and actually to tackle the problems involved.” At the same time Mr Savage is “convinced that some useful work was done and that the Prime Minister should always attend these gatherings.” Mr Savage’s experience may not differ very much from those of other Prime Ministers when attending Imperial Conferences in the past, but no one can deny their undoubted value. The Treasurer of the Commonwealth (Mr It. G. Casey) stressed this point when in Auckland earlier this week. They are valuable, he said, primarily because of the opportunities they afford for an exchange of information and opinions among the leaders of Britain, and the Dominions. But these exchanges are given in confidence and the only results may be the formal resolutions passed. Nevertheless the people are always most anxious to learn from their representatives what has transpired . Mr Savage has given a concise review of the Conference, covering its main business. Naturally, foreign affairs and defence occupied the greatest part of the business, and the two points in brief put forward by the Prime Minister were to remove the economic causes of war by raising the general standard of living throughout the world, and to preserve and make effective the collective peace system established at Geneva. Not everyone will follow the reasoning that if the working man throughout the world is enabled to purchase to the same extent as he produces a major possibility of international conflict will disappear. The evidence of dictator countries to-day surely disproves that thesis, and can the Great War logically be traced to this origin? As for the League Cov-

enant, British foreign policy finds in it its cornerstone, but it lias been weakened by Germany, Italy, and Japan’s withdrawal, and by the United States’s refusal to adhere to President Wilson’s ideal. At present Britain and France are the only two first-class Powers remaining steadfast to the League’s principles, but all will hope that the League of Nations will not perish and that in time to come the ideal of world peace will be translated into a reality through the observance by all nations of the Covenant. On the vital question of defence the Prime Minister urged a common policy fpr all the Empire and from the discussions he anticipates benefit to this country. Co-ordination of defence is a most important subject, and a few years ago Sir Maurice Hankey as Secretary of the Committee of Imperial Defence visited this country with an Australian delegate to discuss plans for a closer alliance between the two Dominions on this question. Trade and migration were discussed at the Conference on the lines of the _ Government's policy, and shipping—as the result of the deliberations hereon “it seems that modern vessels under the British flag will be available for the trans-Pacific service at no very distant date” —and air transport were other subjects upon which much time was spent with profit. The review of the Conference’s work will be read with interest, and with the hope that from the deliberations the Empire will derive the greatest benefit, strengthening it still further as-the greatest stabilising force to-day in a very unsettled world.