News of the Week
The Last Lap THE dosing week of the election campaign has been conspicuous for a great deal of vigorous cross- swearing, of which the public is extremely tired, between members of the late Labour Cabinet as to who was or was not in favour of a tariff or a cut in the dole, and under what conditions and subject to what reserves. That matters very little to anyone now, even if a laborious collation of all the various leakages led to any clear conclusion as to the facts. The issue to-day is not what the Labour Cabinet, or this section of it or that, might have done, but what the National Cabinet, if confirmed in office, as it is reasonably certain that it will be, intends to do. This fundamental question has been to some extent over- shadowed by speculations, all too reminiscent of the controversies of thirty years ago, as to what the National Cabinet's tariff policy is. Mr. MacDonald and Mr. Snowden, Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Chamberlain have all assisted to elucidate or obscure it. From their various declarations, particularly the Prime Minister's election address, it is reasonable to conclude that the mandate, if honestly interpreted, will be for a candid examination of the tariff expedient in its direct relation to the emer- gency of the moment—that and no more than that. But friends of tariffs can always draw comfort from the reflection that a tariff is ten times easier to put on than to take off, and that emergency measures have a way of long surviving the crisis they were designed to meet.
