465

A.—s

Sir WILFRID LAURIER : You are the best judge of that. This resolution, as Mr. Deakin says, has been in existence for five years, and it has not disturbed anybody. Sir JOSEPH WARD : It would have a very undesirable effect, which I assume you would be the last one in the world to bring about, of practically reversing a proposal carried by a former Conference, whether generally adhered to or not, is another question. One colony, New Zealand, having introduced legislation to conform to it, to a large extent, if you refuse to re-affirm it now it looks like going back upon the 1902 resolution. Mr. LLOYD GEORGE : The resolution was passed in 1902 and the Imperial Government have inquired and made up their minds. To say at the end of five years that they are going to inquire again, is rather puerile. You have dealt with the question as the result of the resolution, and Australia means to deal with it next year. For us it would be purely childish. We do not mean to deal with it. We mean to leave it alone. But here is a perfectly new point raised by Sir Wilfrid Laurier, and there I think we ought to inquire, but so far as the trade between the Mother Country and the Possessions is concerned, it would be quite misleading for us to say we had the slightest intention of dealing with it in the sense of reprisals against the United States and Russia, who are the only two countries involved. But you are raising a different point, and it would strengthen the resolution and show we mean business to confine it to that. We have inquired into the subject and come to the conclusion that we cannot do anything; but in our judgment something may be done with regard to inter-Colonial trade. Sir WILLIAM LYNE : Would you suggest anything being done with regard to inter-Colonial trade ? Mr. LLOYD GEORGE : We are quite willing to look into that matter. It seems to me that there is a case. Of course it will have to be done at the request of the Colonial legislatures; but I believe there would have to be an Imperial Act to take power by Order in Council to exclude countries not giving fair treatment to Colonial shipping. It would have to be an Imperial measure. I suggest leaving out "between the Mother Country and its Colonies and Possessions," so that the sentence would read " including trade between " one Colony or Possession and another to countries in which the corre- " sponding trade is confined to ships of their own nationality." That is the real case you have to look into as far as I am aware. Mr. DEAKIN : I stand by the resolution as it is. Sir JOSEPH WARD : I do not think the alteration would be any use, with all deference to Mr. Lloyd George, because if you look at the resolution as altered, it means we have to look into the question as affecting shipping belonging to our own country. Mr. LLOYD GEORGE : No. Sir JOSEPH WARD : Pardon me, we are confined to our own waters, and we can do that now. We do not want a resolution of the Conference to do that. Mr. LLOYD GEORGE : No, this pledges us; it is not a pledge by you merely. I am not trying to get out of the pledge for the Imperial Government.

Thirteenth Day. 8 May 1907.

Coastwise Trade.

60—A. 5.