Waarevur signs of apathy there may have been in the country at the time of the election, there can be little doubt that the nation as u Pp, whole will follow the first session of the new Parliament of the United Kingdom with the keenest. interest. Unless some indication of the Cabinet's intentions had been allowed to leak out previously, the opening of Parliament itself must have been accompanied by more than the usual quota of public expectation; for however quietly the course of the session may eventually run, its potentialities for the sensational are enormous. Bat again the King's Speech followed the traditional lines of a comparatively colourless pronouncement, and its significance, indeed, lies as much in what it leaves un. said as in what it contains. The negotiations with Japan for a new treaty of Commerce are given a prominent place in the recital of matters of foreign policy, and the correctness of the attitude in Persia is confirmed by the statement that such proposals as have been made " hi no other object than to see the authority of the Persian Government restored and trade protected." Further measures of social legislation are promised, and it is safe to assume that the three innovations outlined in the King's Speech—the removal of the pauper disqualification from Old Age Pensions, insurance against sickness and invalidity and insurance againt unemployment—will entail an additional burden upon the Home taxpayer. Finally the reference to the constitutional issue on which the nation's attention is riveted is contained in the clause that proposals will be submitted for settling the relations of the two Houses of Parliament with the object of securing more effective working of the Constitution.
TE the Speech was reticent on the great topic of the day, it can hardly be said that the Premier in his opening address to the House of Commons was much more explicit. He appears to have contented himself with expressing the conviction that the process of translating the country's reiterated
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