LORD BIRKENHEAD ON THE PRESS

Evening Star, Issue 19855, 2 May 1928, Page 3

LORD BIRKENHEAD ON THE PRESS

Lord Birkenhead was the principal guest, at. a luncheon on the occasion of the opening of Lite new Press Club at .Liverpool. Gold Birkenhead said;—“l suppose I an. almost.as clearly entitled to speak Lo pressmen am) journalists as anyone here. Jt is an undoubted fact that it is exactly thirty-two years since i is rotc my lirst leading article. 1 regret to 'say that it was not in Hie 1 Liverpool Post,’ which in that day did not encourage meritorious youth. Jt was tho ‘ Birkenhead Advertiser,’ a newspaper of sterling judgment, and sound literary instincts. (Daughter.) I suppose I may almost claim that I. have founded a family of journalists. My daughter, at any rate, seems to can; a very comfortable living for herself, and, 1 am glad to say, pays for her own clothes and her own taxi cabs, which is a very great consideration in the life of modern London; and in; son, to whom I must, without any excessive optimism, look to carry on the family fortunes, was not only editor ot iho ‘ Eton Chronicle,’ but is already in his first year at Oxford the editor of the paper known as the * Oxford Review.’ ” Lord Birkenhead recalled that wlien he was first elected to Parliament, in I9(Jd, the ‘ Liverpool Daily Post ’ announced that they wished to hear nothing more of him, and did not propose to provide him with the notoriety and advertisement which alone counted with him. (Laughter.) “ I was pained, but not unduly discourager], because I obscurely surmised that in the span of life that remained lo me I might make statements which even that paper might find it inconvenient entirely in suppress. (Laughter.) As a politician I have always envied the Press, which has many great advantages as compared with ns. A politician is expected to say the. same thing not indeed for five weeks, but for five years. Every wellappointed newspaper office keeps a file in which it places on record the observations and commitments of leading politicians in order that it may expose, pillory, and ridicule their inconsistencies. No really adequately tonducted newspaper has ever found-it worth while to keep a file to record the journalistic opinions of its contemporaries.”

Returning thanks later, Lord Birkenhead spoke of the great debt he owed to Pressmen, and concluded:—“ It was with, the spirit.of a.comrade who owes so much to' other comrades that I accepted the kindness of your invitation to-day.” ‘ .