SECRETS DISCLOSED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 68, 21 March 1934, Page 7

SECRETS DISCLOSED.

Mr Lansbury's Son Fined for Use of Official Document. BOOK ON LABOUR LEADER. (Received 12 noon.) LONDON, March 20. Mr. Edgar Lansbury, a son of the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. George Lansbury, was fined £20 and £25 costs on a charge of contravention of the Official Secrets Act in a book, "George Lansburv, My Father," in which he ineluded a certain official memorandum which his father submitted to Cabinet while First Commissioner of Works in tho Labour Ministry during the 1931 crisis. Defendant was served with a summons returnable on March 19, and the publishers have withdrawn the book and will issue a revised edition. Mr. Lansbury's memorandum suggested "sacrifices all round," including an emergency tax on all incomes over £500, ranging from 2 to 10 per cent. He contended that this was essential unless tho Cabinet was willing to say, "Let the unemployed and down-and-outs starve."

Edgar Lansbury, in a statement says that Mr. Ramsay Mac Donald repeatedly said his father opposed unemployment "cuts." "I inserted the memorandum to show the real issues."