LONDON LETTER.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 40, 17 February 1937, Page 21

LONDON LETTER.

WAR OF MANY NATIONS PRESS AND ROYAL FAMILY. A NEW WAB MINISTER. (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, January 22. Actual details of the numbers of foreign volunteers now fighting in Spain , .-; civil war are scanty and generally unreliable. What purports to be an authoritative estimate, published in London this week, gives the surprisingly high total of 64,000, fairly equally divided between Franco and the Government. Only about a third of these are trained soldiers, the remainder being amateurs, intellectuals and enthusiasts more or lees unfitted for serious, fighting. Italy, according to thie estimate, contributes by far the largest total to both sides. There are said to be 19,000 Italian fascists fighting with Franco and 5000 Italian anti-Fascista with the Government. Some 17,000 Germans are in the field-12,000 Nazis with the insurgents and 5000 emigres on the other side. Five thousand Frenchmen are almost solidly with the Government, and so, of course, are 2000 Russians. Britain's "volunteers, numbering only about 1000, are also chiefly Government •leng with some 8000 Socialist* from all ever Europe. Though fairly evenly balanced in numbers', the military value of the two volunteer armies is very different * n "S* f: 00 " are 7 nelfly ali trained soldiers, while the Government supporters (except for the Soviet contmgent) are mostly men who have litherto fought for Socialism only on the platform. *

Rumour and the Koyal Family. Since the unprecedented affair of" the ?£? IC «^\ t £! re h * Ve ■ be « 8 that the British ie adopting a franker and lew reticent attitude toward* the Koyal Family. This change of attitude enabled several newspaper* last week to publish—accompanied by a vigorous denial—rumonre that the Duke of Kent And hie Duchess were becoming estranged. Many respectable eyebrowe were raised at this publicity, which ■would have been unthinkable a. few ■weeke ago.

But on the whole public opinion supported the action of tie newspapers. It put an end to a malicious whispering campaign which had been going on for come time. Many people believe that the affair of King Edward and Mrs. Simpeon would have had a different and 3l happier end had similar frankness been possible in the early daye of their association. The King himself desired frankness. But instead gossip had a free rein, until at last the newe buret with shattering suddenne«e upon the British public. A Minister , *: Future. The name of Mr. Duff Cooper, Minister of War, is the- latest to be mentioned in connection with the coming changes in the Cabinet. It ie suggested that he may be dropped or moved to another - department because of his failure at the job of national recruiting sergeant. la the reconstructed Cabinet, says rumour, the War Office may go to the diminutive and most •unwarlike-looking Sir Kingsley Wood, now Minister of Health.

What truth there is in such rumours it is impossible to say. Certainly Mr. Duff Cooper has a good deal of sympathy from those who know him. .In his first impprtant ministerial job he has been given the toughest of all nuts to crack, .and if he has failed it is not for want of vigorous platform campaigning. He may not be a very well-known or popular personality with the country at large, but it would be unfair to talk of failure until he has tried out his various schemes for making the Army a more attractive career. This will cost money —and it is the Chancellor who holds the purse strings. Britain'* Rich Men. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, planning the new taxes which everybody expects, will be interested in the facts revealed by e. Royal Economic Society eurvey of the Englishman's income, just published. It shews that moderately rich men are growing more and more numerous in Britain. Nearly a million people now earn or derive from investment, incomes of over £500 a year. Over 300,000 people get £1000 a year or more, and these will probably be Mr. Chamberlain's chief prey. The concentration of wealth at the top of the tree is shown by the fact that 10,000 people in the country have between them an income of about £200,000,000—an average of £20,000 a year each. At the other end of the scale there are aome 12,000,000 people earning less than £125 a year. large numbering about *m>oo.ooo who get between £125 and xoOO. Overdrafts Mean Prosperity. Though Mr. Baldwin himself has confessed to living on an overdraft, the average man still does not regard being in debt to his bank as a mark of prosperity. It is different, however, with businesses, and the announcement this ■week that private traders in Britain now owe £30,000,000 more in overdrafts thana year ago is hailed as a sign that good times are returning. Business men owe their banks the colossal total of £857,000,000.

This may look ae though traders are hard up, but what it really shows' ie that the banks are so confident in the soundness and success of private business that they are willing to stake all those millions on it. During the depths of the elump the banks became nervous and were unwilling to lend, with the result that the overdraft total fell to a very low figure. Conversely, during the last boom everyone was so full of confidence that overdrafts jumped up to above £1,000,000,000. Lost at Sea. Everyone will remember what a large number of wrecks and other "dramas of the high seas" occurred last year. Now come official underwriters' figures to prove that 1930 was indeed one of the unluckiest yearn of the past decade. More than 150 ships, aggregating 367,000 tons, were lost, and over 6000 were damaged. Exceptionally stormy periods during the year were undoubtedly partly responsible for this toll. Partly, bowever, it is a sign of brisker international, trade. Many old ships, long laid up, were called into service again. Th» meant not only that there were more ships at sea than in previous years, but also that a larger proportion of them were "old crocks," liable to damage and accident.