15 OCTOBER 1921, Page 2

Mr. Hughes, the Australian Prime Minister, announced on Thursday, October

6th, that Mr. Lloyd George had pressed him to go to the Washington Conference as a member of the British Empire delegation, or to send a representative. The Commonwealth House accepted the appointment of Senator Pearce, Minister of Defence, as a delegate. Mr. Hughes read the telegrams in which Mr. Lloyd George had expressed his inability to go to Washington and his desire that the Dominions and India should be represented there. New Zealand, it is stated, will send Sir John Salmond to the conference. We shall decline to accept Mr. Lloyd George's reasons for not going to Washington as conclusive. His presence at the opening sessions seems to us imperatively necessary.