General Smuts, in a speech made in South Africa, and
Mr. Massey, in an interview just before his departure for New Zealand, have both spoken strongly on the necessity of carrying through such promises of Imperial preferences as were made by the British Government at the recent Imperial Conference. Both of them pointed out that the Dominions would take it very hardly indeed if, after all the labour expended upon the subject, the mere fact of a change of Government here should make the decisions useless. We quite agree with thein. We are not in favour of preferential tariffs in the abstract, because we have never been able to believe that they will effect what their advocates expect of them, but we see that the Imperial Conference is in some danger of being brought into derision if all its work may be undone at a moment's notice by a change of GoVernment here.
Previous page
