IMPROPER CONDUCT

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 69, 18 September 1936, Page 16

IMPROPER CONDUCT

A PUBLIC SERVANT AIR SECRETARY'S DISMISSAL ACTION APPROVED (From "The Post's" Representative.) ~.\v. LONDON, .August 8, The dismissal of Sir Christopher Bullock, Permanent Secretary to the Air Ministry,, by the Prime Minister, Mr. Stanley Baldwin, and the reasons for that decision, caused both surprise and regret. So high stand the traditions of the Civil Service and so jealously and honourably are they observed that any stain or tarnish is felt almost as a national wound.

. Much relief was expressed, therefore, at the Prime Minister's statement that "grave as was the offence from a service point of view, no question of corruption was involved," together with the assurance by the Board of Inquiry that the "improper discussions" in which Sir Christopher Bullock persisted "have riot influenced the negotiations for the projected contract between Departments of State and Imperial Airways or the general relations between those Departments and the company. The action by the Prime Minister followed upon the findings of a Board of Inquiry appointed to investigate certain conversations between Sir Christopher and representatives of Imperial Airways concerning the possibility of his future association with that company. The report declared that these conversations by Sir Christopher were improper in a civil servant. The members of the Board of Inquiry were Sir G. Evelyn P. Murray, chairman of the Board of Customs and Excise; Sir Richard V. N. Hopkins, Second Secretary of the Treasury; and Mr. L. A. J. Granville Ram, Second Parliamentary Counsel. j THE ALLEGATIONS. The allegations were based upon interviews between Sir Christopher and Sir Eric Geddes, chairman of Imperial 'Airways, and Mr. Woods-Humphrey, I the managing director, during the negotiations for the contract between the [Government and Imperial Airways.

In the interviews with Sir Eric Geddes, it is stated. Sir Christopher pointed out that he had no prospect of further advancement in the Civil Service. He said that he would like to succeed Sir- Eric Geddes as chairman of Imperial Airways, and suggested that he might get himself nominated as one of the two Government directors on the board, as a step to the chairmanship. Sir Eric Geddes, it is stated, vt as much disturbed by these conversations, and reported them to Mr; Woods-Humphrey, and another colleague of the board. In the report submitted by the Board of Inquiry, published as a White Paper, it was stated that in an interview-with Sir Eric Geddes in May, 1934, Sir Christopher Bullock, after a conversation on another matter, turned to a fresh topic and asked what Sir Eric thought of his chances of succeeding Sir Erie as chairman of Imperial Airways. Sir Eric replied that he had "no idea about going."';' Sir , Christopher then suggested that' hVmight be able to get himself nominated as a Government director of Imperial Airways. He neither asked for nor received any promise of Sir Eric's support. Sir Eric,, says the report, was disturbed at Sir Christopher's ambitions to join the board and become chairman, a course to which he was altogether opposed. QUESTION OF AN HONOUR.

„;Pn : Juhe: 21, .1934, = Sir Christopher Bullock had a long discussion with Sir Eric Geddes op the proposed agreement between the Government and Imperial Airways. Afterwards the question of a proposed honour for Sir Eric Geddes (which had been mentioned in the May interview) came up, and Sir Eric said, "with a certain warmth which Sir Christopher did ribt appreciate, that if it was to be a reWard for negotiating the agreement, it was out of the question, at present, and they would just forget about it." "We feel bound to record,"; the board says, "although it bears only indirectly on the subject of our inquiry, that Sir Christopher's handling of the matter was in more than one respect ill conceived and injudicious." Later in the same conversation, Sir Christopher again brought up his plan to seek appointment as a Government director with a view to .his ultimately succeeding Sir Eric in the chairmanSir Eric, r who found the topic distasteful, endeavoured to give discouragement to Sir Christopher's ambitions, and, feeling uneasy, he made a note', of his recollections of the two conversations, which he showed.to the managing director and another of his co-directors. •

On September 1, 1935, there was another meeting, when Sir Eric Geddes told Sir Christopher Bullock that he "found it very embarrassing to discuss with him the question of his coming on to the board, just as he' had been embarrassed by the discussion as to the bestowal of an honour upon himself, while negotiations for a contract between the company, and the -Ministry were still being conducted." The report remarks that Sir Christopher, in his evidence about this interview, acknowledged that, although he did not gather the impression that Sir Eric desired that the subject should never be mentioned again, he did realise that Sir Eric felt that they had much better not discuss such i questions until the agreement was signed. On June 'll, 1936, there was a discussion between Sir Christopher Bullock and Mr. Woods Humphery, the managing director of Imperial Airways, when the chairmanship of the company was again mentioned. This discussion, Mr. Woods-Humphery told the Board of Inquiry, had "a very disturbing effect upon his mind." Sir Christopher said he relied upon Mr. WoodsHuniphery's discretion "not to mention, this to anyone"—not even to the chairman—because he wished to mention it himself in the first instance, and he proposed to take an early opportunity of doing so. THE BOARD'S CONCLUSIONS.

While the Board of Inquiry does not criticise Sir Christopher's desire to link his future with Imperial Airways,, it thinks that the special and intimate relations existing f between the Air Ministry and the company made it "intrinsically improper, for him to initiate conversations with its chairman or any other representative of the company in furtherance of that desire." "We think that the whole course of these proceedings shows on the part of. Sir Christopher, a lack of that instinct and perception from which is derived the sure guide by which .the conduct. of a civil servant should be regulated." " Upon the day that Sir Christopher's dismissal was announced a letter from him,-replying to the Prime Minister's decision, was .published in conjunction with the report of the Board of Inquiry. In it he said:—

"It would be both churlish and unprofitable to challenge the main findings of fact (or rather attempted reconstructions of conversations) by the recent Board of Inquiry, which showed me patience, consideration, and impartiality. If their report contains a few statements which I maintain are incorrect, and, in consequence, some observations which are (to my thinking) scarcely fair; if, indeed, at one or two points the draftsman's pen has •

i ■ ■ ■ ■ . •. •■ barb, the fault no doubt lies with my inadequate elucidation in the later stages of galling and wearisome proceedings with which I had to cope single-handed. I have not disputed the main outlines of the conversations. Given certain not unimportant additions and omissions and a few changes of phraseology (more particularly in the case of the last two conversations) they accord broadly with my own recollection. ■ ' . "I do not seek to burke responsibility for consequences which _have flowed from niy own actions. But it 1 is easy to be wise after the event; and fortunate is he—be he politician, sailor, soldier, airman, journalist, or civil ser-vant->-who can honestly say that, 11 [ every private and informal conversaition he has held were sifted and resifted months, even years, afterwards in the rarefied atmosphere of a solemn ! and formal inquisition, no passing I phrase uttered in an unguarded l moment could be held injudicious, no word or deed be called in question in ! some degree by absolute standards of taste or propriety." PUBLIC APPROVE ACTION. All shades of political opinion agree that the correct action has been taken by the holding of the inquiry and the subsequent dismissal following upon the evidence submitted. It is pointed out that Sir Christopher. Bullock broke the Civil Service code, but that the code is more than the man, regrettable though his fall must be. It is pointed out that members of the same service holding a lower office, such as an Inspector of Taxes, a. clerk, or a postman a?e dismissed without iear or favou? for breaches of the Code, and that no lighter punishment would be, tolerable m "he case of a responsible head .of a Ministry? the Civil Service is conupon having taken into its S tends the inflexible maintenance of its great traditions, and it is declared Sat it'will not suffer in the long run for such a ruthless exposure. -■ ■ Sir Christopher Bullock was Permanent Secretary of the Air Min sU-y_ and a member of the Air C^ffo* salary of £3OOO * year, since 1931, *«£ serving for two years as- AssistantSecretlry. He was only 39 when he Sclme Permanent Secretary. He was Principal Private Secretary to Mr. wSi Churchill, as Secretary of State for Air, in 1919, and from 1923 to M3O he acted in the same capacity to Sir Samuel Hoare and the late Lord Sir Ch*h*ter Bg iock y will.lose:the pension^to i.which he would , have been entitled on his retirement from the Civil Service.