The Chairman:

Allow me to say one word about "desirable." I hope we shall not be content with that word. (Hear, hear.) Everybody desires it. We have got beyond merely wishing it, and we think that something bad will happen if we do not get it.

The resolution was then submitted to the meeting in the following form, and passed unanimously:—"That, in order to secure the permanent unity of the Empire, some form of Federation is essential."