London, Sept. 22.
The opening of the Imperial Conference, which will assemble London next week, is awaited with een interest.
It is anticipated that the most important diseassions will be those dealing with economic questions and their range will be of the widest character. They will embrace tariff changes and the extent and effect of inter Imperial tariff preferences, bulk purchase, agricultural and industrial research, and Empire transport and communications, including shipping, aviation, cables' and wireless.
The Scerctary for the Dominions, Mr, J. H. Thomas, referred to the complex problems before the Con ference in a speech at the Wool Research Conference in London to-da, He said, "There never was an Imperial Conference held in. more difficult circumstances but,—equall never swas there a conference more necessary. Each constituent part of the Empire is faced with its own. domestic and economic problems. We in the Old Country are passing' through ap unexampled in history. I have confidence however that the old spirit of great deter-the past At the Imperiat Conference we shall sit down, not with a desire to think for ourselves alone but with a tingle-minded desire to see how we can combine our brains and enerszies to make the best use of the empire with its unlimited potentialijes and possibilities for the common It is officially announced that as the Prime Minister of Canada will not be able to reach London until the evening of September 30 the meeting of the Imperial Conference has been deferred until October, 1.—
Reuter.
London, Sept. 24.
On the eve of the Imperial Conference a joint memorandum by the Trades Unions Congress and the, Federation of British Industries has been addressed to the Prime ter, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald.
The memorandum stresses the Importance of increasing inter= Commonwealth trade, and urges the summoning at an early date of a Commonwealth trade conference fan investigatory, advisory and nonparty nature. The members of the conference, it adds, should be nominated by each Government of the Empire. However, they should act personal capacity, and they [should consist of representatives of industry, agriculture and finance, both employers and employed.
The memorandum states that the Conference should ascertain the lews of the Dominions regarding possible further reciprocal arrangements, and that it shoul be a permanent part of the Commonwealth economic machinery and should meet each Imperial Conference to it views upon problems awol ing a solution.
The memorandum suggests also the creation of a permanent Commonwealth economic secretariat, the personnel to be drawn from all parts of the Empire, to act as a permanent secretariat for all Im-Conferences on economic jons—Reater.
London, Sept. tion is advanced in a. prelimin general report which has been sued by the Research Committee of the Empire Economic Union and circulated among the Dominion delegates to the Imperial Conference.
Lord Melchete is chairman of the Union and the Research Committee is under the chairmanship of Mr. 1. C. Amery, who was Secretary for the Colonies in the late Conservative Government.
The report sets out its ease for special stimulation of _inter~ Imperial trade and gives in appendlees draft leads of suggested y trade agreements between the ited igdom, the Dominions and Mui A general system of tariff preferences is recommended as a means for achieving the purpose it has in few, the report declaring that this volves a minimum of international complication because every nation accepts without challenge the pri ple that every other nation
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.