1546 IMPERIAL UNITY [PART VIII 
Suez Canal constitute a heavy charge, and tend to retard 
the trade within the Empire and with other countries, and 
invites the Government of the United Kingdom to continue 
to use their influence for the purpose of obtaining a substan- 
tial reduction of the present charges.’ 
(s) Celebration of the King’s Birthday! 
Agreement was readily arrived at to have an official 
celebration of the King’s birthday on June 3, but an attempt 
to make the King’s birthday Empire Day failed. New 
Zealand was ready to accept this, but Canada preferred to 
remain firm to May 24, and South Africa was unwilling to 
change that day; Australia admitted that it was really 
not a federal but a state question, and the matter dropped 
on Sir Wilfrid Laurier observing that the question was not 
worth a discussion. 
(t) Future Conferences 
On the last day of the Conference it was proposed by 
Mr. Fisher that, in the first place, there should be interchange 
of visits between the responsible ministers of the several 
Dominions, and that, in the second place, the Imperial 
Government should take into consideration the question of 
the possibility of holding a meeting of the Imperial Con- 
ference in one of the self-governing Dominions? The first 
part of his resolution was welcomed on all sides, and the 
Imperial Government gladly accepted it as far as they were 
concerned. But it was pointed out that the second part 
would raise considerable difficulties. Sir Joseph Ward and 
General Botha both laid some stress on the fact that it was 
impossible in the Dominions to collect the full apparatus 
of information which was provided by the Government 
departments in the United Kingdom, and pointed out 
the advantages which accrued from the ministers of the 
Dominions meeting at once all the ministers of the Imperial 
Government, which would not be the case if the Conference 
Ld. 5745, pp. 274-8. 
? Ibid., pp. 433 seq.