THE DEFENCE MINISTER.

Auckland Star, Volume LI, Issue 206, 28 August 1920, Page 7

THE DEFENCE MINISTER.

» CTVTL OR MILITARY? (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, Friday. Strong exception was -taken by Mr. T. M. Wilford to procedure in the appointment of the Minister of Defence. He explained that this attitude was disassociated from any piesonai feeling. It was simply perpetuating an opinion he had previously expressed as recently as when Sir James Allen held the portfolio. "I am absolutely against a colonel of volunteers being Minister of Defence." he said. "I think failure in our defence administration is due to the fact that no civilian mind is utilised." Continuing, he contended that once a Minister donned uniform he lost prestige nith senior officers. "Tho defjneo advi.crv committee had not a civilian '.a ii ' added Mr. Wilford. "In iact tho whole run of defence doesn't disclose a civilian mind." He would never bo convinced that a civilian would Rot make the bei?t Defence Minister, becanee military officers would never be Influenced byoflicers of lower rank, yet the greatest lawyers recognised the value of advice outside the legal sphere. Military men became steeped in one particular line, and, to a certain extent, narrow. "No doubt," he eoncJuded. "Mr. Coates had benefited by his recent war services, but 1 would hate to see him Minister ol Defence. S'r Heaton Rhodes, in reply, eaid that though he was a colonel in the defence force.-, he was sufficiently a civilian t.i look at defence matters from a civilian point of view. "This is a point that lost King Charles his head," said Mr. Atmore. The Minister, he added, should have military advison;. but he should be guided, not controlled, by them. He was of opinhn that no one who had had military training should become Minister of Defence. Mr. V. H. Potter contended that whar was wanted was not a sp.se tvi-t,. >in either skie, but a combination of practical and theoretical ideas. The general pu.-pose of a civilian at the head of defence was to act as a buffer between experts ai i the general taxpayer, said Mr. Downic Stuart, but 'he could not see any objection to .fir Heaton Rhodes. If Mr. Atmore's idea was carried to a logical conclusion the Prime Minister, as a farmer, would not make a successful Minister of Agricuiture, and Mr. Wilford would not sattefv as Minister of Justice. There would be nothing for it, he averred, but to have the member for Buller as Defence Minister.