Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. SATURDAY, JUNE 7, 1924. THE AUTHOR OF “SUCCESS”

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XLIV, Issue 10131, 7 June 1924, Page 4

Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. SATURDAY, JUNE 7, 1924. THE AUTHOR OF “SUCCESS”

Ifew men in. tlie British world have scaled .the Heights of Olympus with.apparently greater facility than Lord Beaver brook. As solo owner of the London “Daily Express,” part proprietor of a, group of London, and provincial papers, he has from small beginnings become what is termed a “power in the land. He knows something of the quality we call “Success.’ He hns written a hook on it, dedicated to all young men. He descended (“invaded” one writer calls it) on England 14 years ago, and it was a case of veni, vidi, vici—-he came, he saw, he conquered. He was then known as Max Aitken. The son of a Presbyterian minister, of New Brunswick, Canada, he became in quick succession, Knight, Baronet, Peer of the Realm and war-time Minister. Of his life prior to going to London little was known. It is understood he had a short and highly successful career in the West Indies before he set up in business in Halifax and Montreal. In Canada he achieved great things as a financier and lumberman.. He made money rapidly, and when he reached London in 1910 he was a young, rich man. At the end of one year’s residence he was well known in the city .and better known at Westminster. His social and political progress rather recalled that of Mr Veneering in: “Our Mutual Friend.” People who had known him a fortnight somehow felt they were the chosen companions of his boyhood, and he rapidly collected round him more intimate friends than the ordinary man makes in a lifetime. In company with some of them he went down to Ashton-under-Lyne, as Mr Veneering did to Pocket Breech.es,, and won a whirlwind election campaign.

The next year he was knighted. He allied himself with the extreme tariff reformers and was searching London for a daily paper so as to have a vehicle for expounding his creed. Sir Max grew rapidly in political stature. He was* seldom heard in the House of Commons, but constantly felt in the Lobbies. In due course his ambitions for direct newspaper influence were realised—he acquired the London “Daily Express.” In the war years he was appointed Director of Propaganda. He is known to have played an important part in the downfall of the Government in 1916. Towards the end of that; year there was much disunion in the British Cabinet and great discontent in the country. Mr Lloyd George, while on terms of personal friendship with Mr Asquith, was profoundly out of sympathy with some features of his policy and when Mr Asquith went down Sir Max Aitken disappeared and Baron Beaverbrook took his place. In certain circles in Britain there was a great deni of uneasiness regarding the ease with' which 1 an ambitious man. ' going as a stranger to Britain,

could in a few years raise himself to a position of great political influence. Lord Beaverbrook lias not lost his friendship with. Mr Lloyd George, and during the last general election in Britain it was asserted , that in collaboration with Lord Birkenhead and Mr Lloyd George, he was anxious for the formation of a new party. The Conservatives led by Mr Stanley Baldwin had refused to agree to the inclusion of either Lord Birkenhead or Mr Austen Chamberlain in Cabinet on account of previous cleavages in regard to policy, particularly at the time of the fall of the Coalition Government and .the famous Carlton Club meeting and resolution, when Mr Chamberlain was hissed by the Conservatives on account of his allegiance to Mr Lloyd George. Subsequently, on the eve of the last general election, a meeting was held between Lord Beaverbrook, Mr Lloyd George, and Lord Birkenhead, and it later transpired .that the policy of the “Daily Express” as with the j “Daily Mail” and all the Rother- ! mere group, was, to use a homely l expression, to throw cold water !on the Baldwin proposals. Although outwardly expressing approval of Protection, the Beaver-brook-Rothermere combination contended .that the Conservative Party was not going far enough —Mr Baldwin should have adopted the whole of the policy of the late Mr Joseph Chamberlain, including food taxes. By an insidious Press campaign the aim was to bring about precisely what happened, namely, to make the position of parties an ineffective whole. That is certainly the case. Not .one Party represented in the House can function on its own. Possibly the last has not been heard of the BeaverbrookLloyd George - Birkenhead meeting. One cannot tell what may happen with politicians of that type.