LABOUR GOVERNMENT

Evening Star, Issue 20196, 8 June 1929, Page 13

LABOUR GOVERNMENT

THE MINISTRY ANNOUNCED i. MR PHILIP SNOWDEN AS CHANCELLOR RUGBY, June 7. (Received Juno 8, at noon.) The list of the new Labour Government is as follows: Prime Minister: Mr Ramsay MacDonald. Chancellor of the Exchequer: Mr Philip Snowden.: Secretary of Foreign Affairs: Mr Arthur Henderson. Lord Privy Seal: Mr J. H. Thomas. Minister of Dominion Affairs and Colonies: Mr Sidney Webb. Lord President of the Council: Lord Parmoor. Lord Chancellor: Lord Justice Santley. Minister of Home Affairs: Mr J. R. Clynes. , Secretary of State for India: Cap-' tain Wedgwood Benn, Minister of War: Mr Thomas Shaw. Minister of Air: Lord Thomson. Minister of Health: Mr A. Greenwood, Minister of Labour: Miss Bondfield. Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries: Mr Noel Buxton. President of the Board of Education: Si.' C. P. Trevelyn. President of the Board of Trade: Mr W. Graham. First Lord of the Admiralty: Mr A. V. Alexander. Secretary of State for Scotland: Mr W. Adamson. First Commissioner of Works: Mr George Sansbury. All the above appointments carry with them scats in the Cabinet. Other Ministerial posts announced are : Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster: Sir Oswald Mosley. Attorney-Genera!: Mr W. Jowitt. King’s Counsel and Solicitor-Gene-ral: Mr J. B. Melville. King’s Counsel and Minister of Pensions; Mr F. 0. Roberts. Minister of Transport: Mr Herbert Morrison. Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Scotland: Mr T. Johnston, Postmaster-General: Professor H. B. Lee-Smith. Paymaster-General: Lord Arnold (without pay).

ONLY ONE SURPRISE LONDON, June 7. (Received June 8, at 12.5 p.m.) Mr MacDonald’s Cabinet-making lias followed expected lines, with one noteworthy surprise. It was known that Mr J. H. Thomas wanted something bigger than his old office. Indeed he aspired to the Foreign Office, but when ho yielded to Sir MacDonald’s blandishment that the big job of unemployment wanted a big man with vision and initiative it caused a recasting of the political guessing, with no one in the offing to fill the dominions’ blank. There' was never a breath of the suggestion that Mr Sidney Webb would be selected. —Australian Press Association. ATTORNEY-GENERAL APPOINTMENT A SURPRISE. RUGBY, June 7. (Received June 8, at I p.m.) Considerable surprise has been created in political circles by the statement that Mr Jowitt, an eminent King’s Counsel, who is a Liberal, has been offered the post of Attorney-Gen-eral in Mr MacDonald’s Ministry. Mr Jowitt’s position is somewhat peculiar. He won as a Liberal one of the two seats at Preston, the other scat being won by Mr 'Porn Shaw, a Labourite. It is claimed that Mr Jowitt was elected by the aid of the Labour votes. Ihe post is one of very great importance, apd involves almost invariably close and confidential relations with the Government. It can hardly be regarded as a simple legal office. In the last Government, for instance, Sir Douglas Hogg, as Attorney-General,_ led the House of Commons on most important occasions, such as the long debates on the Trade Disputes Act, and he even deputised for the Prime Minister. The Scottish legal Cabinet appointments are still under consideration. It is also announced that the reason why the name of Sir Hewy Slosser, who was Solicitor-General in the last Labour Government, does not _ appear in the list is that other services have been assigned to him, which will be made known later. It is also pointed out that the Right Hon. Vernon Hartshorn, who was Postmaster-General in the previous Labour Administration, is temporarily engaged on the Indian Statutory Commission. Lord Arnold (unpaid Paymaster-General in the new Government) has accepted the position with nominal duties in order to he free for work in the House of Lords and in other ways.

DOMINION SECRETARY MR SIDNEY WEBB Press Association-By Tolesraph—Copyright. LONDON, June 7. (Received June 3, at 10 a.in.) It is officially stated that the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs will be Mr Sidney Webb.—Australian Press Association. [Mr Sidney Webb, who was born :n London, in 1859, may be called the father of the Labour Party. Ho was the principal founder, in 1881, of the Fabian Society, which has done much propaganda work. Mr Webb, who was educated in London, Switzerland, and Mecklenhurg-Schwerin, was_a clerk in a colonial broker’s office 1875-8, and a Civil Servant 1878-91. From 1892 to 1910 he was a member of the London County Council, and from 1900 to 1909 a member of the senate of London University. In 1392 Mr Webb married Miss Beatrice Potter, who had bellied in the foundation of the Fabian Society, and .the two have collaborated in the au-

thorship of many learned and elaborate volumes on economics and social problems. Mr Webb was the principal founder of the London School of Economics. Ho has been a member of various Royal Commissions. Ho was President of the Board of Trad© in the Labour Ministry of 1924. In the last Parliament Mr Webb was member for the Seaham division of Durham. He did not stand at the recent General Election, his place in tho constituency being taken by Mr Ramsay MacDonald. It was suggested a few days ago that Mr Webb would bo called to the House of Lords. Mr Webb made a tour of Australia and New Zealand a good many years ago, before he entered Parliament.] THE SEALS OF OFFICE. LONDON, June 7. (Received June 8, at 10.30 a.m.) Tbo Cabinet handed over tho seals to His Majesty at Windsor at 4 o’clock and took formal leave.—Australian Press Association. LABOUR AND THE DOMINIONS. IMPERIAL CONFERENCE NEXT YEAR. LONDON, June 7. One of the first matters for Mr Ramsay MacDonald to tackle concerning the Dominions Office is the Imperial Conference. It is understood that Labour is particularly anxious to have discussions with tlio dominion Prime Ministers, as the policy will naturally undergo certain changes, though not necessarily of a drastic nature. Tbo Imperial Conference will definitely be called for 1030 at the earliest moment that can be, arranged to fit in with Labour’s programme.—Australian Press Association. MR JO WITT’S POSITION. LONDON, June 7. Mr Jowitt to-night conferred with the Libera! leaders at Preston, but lie declined to offer any explanation to the Press. Mr Jowitt is one of the ablest men at the Bar, and is described as a great accession to Mr MacDonald’s Government. He was elected with Mr T. Shaw for Preston, a two-member constituency. The Liberals newspapers admit that be did not fight Labour, but co-operated with them. He and Mr Shaw were elected in a four-cornered fight against two Conservatives by the combined Liberal and Labour votes.— Australian Press Association.

[Mr W. A. Jowitt, K.C., is fortyfour years of age. He is a son of the late Rev. William Jowitt, rector of Stevenage. lie was called to the Bar in 1909.]

MR JOWITT'S DECISION. LONDON, June 7. (Received June 8, at 10 a.in.) Mr Jowitt, in a letter to Mr MacDonald on Juno 5, said: Everyone must regard your task with passive sympathy. Those like myself, hitherto Radicals, must consider whether we should support your party as the only effective instrument to carry through the desired reforms. I willingly enrol under your banner.” Mr MacDonald replied, pointing out that it had become a question of choosing which of the two parties one must serve. II j cordially welcomed Mr Jowitt.—Australian Press AssociationUnited Service CONSERVATIVES AND LIBERALS. LONDON, June 7. Mr Baldwin intends to revive the Conservative shadow Cabinet, from which there were such good results in 1924. Ex-Ministers will meet periodically at the party headquarters, St. Stephen’s Chambers, where Mr Baldwin will have his office. The Liberal leaders assembled at Lord Reading’s house and discussed the policy to be recommended to the Liberal parliamentary party, which has been summoned for June 13 to hear a statement from Mr Lloyd George. It is believed that the leaders decided to table an amendment to the King’s Speech, demanding an inquiry into electoral reform. The ‘ Daily Telegraph ’ predicts that the resignation honours will include a pee race for Sir V Ilham Joynson-Hicks. —Australian Press Association.

CAREERS OF NEW MINISTERS MR RAMSAY MACDONALD Mr MacDonald’s face is a true index to his character. There is nothing here of self-seeking, nothing of combativeness lor its own sake, no assertiveness, no cunning. ■ There arc many lines in it, graven by sorrow. When his wife died, the light of joy seemed to have boon extinguished in his heart lor ever, and the years have never recreated its former shine and glow. But ho still has a far-off star to steer by, and the influence which counted for so much in his life is still strong upon him. Thirty years have passed since, and his wife—a woman of rare gilts—was taken from him when she was but a little oyer forty. Even now, after years of political vicissitude, ho is tall and athletic looking, with erect carriage, muscular frame, and splendidly held head and shoulders, while even his silver hair fails to make him look his sixty years. There is a twinkle, often, in his eyes—clear, brown eyes, deep set under dark eyebrows, and his smile is winning and his laughter comes from the heart. Mr MacDonald is a member of that jiroud old Scottish clan that was cut to pieces in the massacre of Glencoe, and the lighting blood runs in ids veins, 'He Is a tighter always, but lie fights with modern weapons. Violence, whether in war or revolution, seems to him botlx wrong and stupid. Iho things that be wants cannot be got in that way. Ills work in the House of Commons is heavy, and iiis duties as Leader of the Labour Party are difficult. Yet lie-; finds time to write books and articles on the subject which is nearest Ids heart, to receive deputations, and to attend to a. vast correspondence. He is one of tlm best read men in England, and his library shows the wide range of his knowledge and interests. Books were Ids university, for he told the late W. T. Stead that the novels of Scott and Hugh Miller’s writings had made him a socialist. Up and down the land, in the houses of the miner, the agricultural worker, the city dweller, and the waterside toiler, his portrait hangs on

tbo wall, and no matter where ho is to speak many times more people than the largest hall can hold throng to hear him Ho gives them something which no political leader since Gladstone has done—tho feeling that politics is something of a religion._ He makes them believe by what he is, no less than by what he says, that a cleaner, finer, happier world is possible, and is within their reach.

MR PHILIP SNOWDEN Mr Philip Snowden entered Parliament in 1900, coming with a groat reputation as an orator from Blackburn. Mis meetings prior to election were more like revival than political meetings, and great things were expected of him in Lancashire. It took, however, some time for his oratory to conquer the House of Commons, because he addressed that largo and difficult assembly much in the same way as ho would a public meeting. He had none of the ordinary pleasing aids of a great speaker which disarm criticism; none of the voice, for example, of John Bright or Gladstone, which, apart from their subject matter, exert a fascination over any audience, like the fascination of music. Ho seemed to regard the. House with hostility, and the House returned the sentiment. Gradually ho conquered the popular, assembly by his obvious sincerity, his increasing powers of debate; and by Ids attractiveness and pleasant companionship with all parties. Broken in body, but with a mind sustained by the clear'vision of a great ideal, be attempted to put into practice during his short holding of the Chancellorship of the Exchequer in the Labour Ministry of ■ 1924 some of the causes for which he had pleaded during a lifetime of passionate effort. ‘‘ Of his sincerity and ability,” said the Right Hon. C. E. (J. Masterman, M.P., recently, “ no man who enjoys his friendship could have any doubt at all. The only doubt is whether these qualities can be efficient in the parliamentary groove of business.” He has had the* courage to denounce the Communist and all his ways, and he is married to a wife who has incurred the undying enmity of the extreme section of the Socialists because of her truthful revelation of what she saw in Russia. Whatever tho future may _ hold politically for Mr Snowden, lie will never lose that general appreciation that, however one may differ from him, is felt because of his never having modified his actions because of personal disadvantage or because of personal gain.

MR ARTHUR HENDERSON If Mr Arthur Henderson, after representing the Barnard Castle Division of Durham without a break from 1903 to 1918, had not begun in recent years to make a foible of putting himself up for unstable constituencies, he might now have been Ihe parliamentary father of his party, though even then, one fancies, he would still have been known as “ Undo Arthur.” Happy the parliamentarian who has earned a nickname, and happier still when he has been let off with one so affectionate. By birth a Clydesider—Mr Henderson was born at Glasgow in 1863—h0 went to school there before migrating to Newcastle to serve his apprenticeship as an ironfounder, afterwards becoming one of the great public men of the Labour movement. In his political aims he may have something in common with the modern Glasgow school, but his methods are those of the North of England trade unionist pioneers, the Burts, the Fenwicks, the John Wilsons, the Enoch Edwardses, and others of that sagacious, steady-going, Jocal-prcaching generation whose old-fashioned virtues and inherited loyalties are modified in their present-day successor by a wider range of experience and greater versatility of outlook. Like his predecessors in the movement, Mr Henderson began as a Liberal, though, unlike them, he eventually became a convert to the doctrine that to fulfil itself Labour must stand alone. He shares with Mr J. R. dynes the advantage of not only having been chairman of the Labour Party, but a Minister as well—first in the Asquith Coalition of 191-5-16 as president of the Board of Education, and then as Paymaster-General, Labour Adviser, and Pensions Minister, and afterwards in the Lloyd George Government ns Minister without portfolio. When Mr Ramsay MacDonald’s Labour Government took over office in 1924 ho accepted a. position in the Cabinet as Home Secretary.

HR J. H. THOMAS “He has found the world a very tolerable place .and lie lias no complaint against a social and political ■system that has enabled the Newport errand buy to ride with the King in ,the train that ho used to drive, and to become a Minister of the Crown and a potential Premier,” writes " A.G.G.” in the ‘Daily News’ in his character sketch of Mr J. If. Thomas. “He is not a doctrinaire, but an empiric and an opportunist, not forgetful of himself, but genuinely loyal to his class, doing his best to improve their condition and, so far as ho has a political philosophy, working for an accommodation between the opposing interests of society. He would rather have peace by negotiation than by the knock-ont blow, and he is happier in stopping a strike than in fomenting one. •• His bark is very loud, but he bites only under compulsion, and he incurred the undying enmity of the ‘ fight-to-a-finisli ’ advocates by smashing the Triple Alliance rather than hold the nation at ransom. He has no passion for dying in the last ditch oi‘ battling for lost causes, and although he will sing the ‘ Red Flag ’ as heartily as anyone, lie has a warm corner in his affections lor the Union Jack.”

LORD PARMCOR Before 1914 Lord Parmoor was known os Sir Alfred Cripps, o Conservative M.P., and was chiefly famous as an ecclesiastical lawyer. _ Of muio recent vears liis c;hiel obsession ims bocn tho League of Nations, and ho may ho summed up as a man who knows a remarkable amount about tilings nl which most people know nothing. He was born in 1852, and educated at Winchester and New College, Oxford, where he obtained four first classes and was elected a Fellow of St. John s. As Mr Cripps, K.C., he abandoned a very largo legal practice in 1895 to enter Parliament for the Stroud Division of Gloucester in the Conservative interests. From 1901 to 1906 he was member for the Stretford Division, and from 1910 to 1914 for the Wycombe Division of Buckinghamshire. He was one ol the leading members of the Royal Commission on Taxation, and took a keen interest in cjnestion of education and local government. He served on the Commission of Inquiry into the Jameson Raid and on the Old Ago Pension Committee, and in addition lie is vicargeneral of both the Archdioceses ol Canterbury and York. He was raised to the peerage in 1908, and became a judicial member of the Privy Council in 1914. Since the war he has been actively engaged in movements for the economic restoration of Itiuope. 11 is first wile was a sister of Mrs Sidney

Webb, which gives some reason lor l"8 close association with the Labour cause of recent years, and in 1919 be married Miss Marian Ellis, of Yorkshuc.

HR J. R. CLYHES Mr Clyncs has already Jiad a taste of office as. Lender of the House oi Commons in the short-lived Labour Government of 1921, and iio found it sweet, though doubtless difficult. He is credited with having displayed great business capacity and administrative abilities of a high order. He was. in fact, a considerable success as a Minister. In 190(5 he was returned as Labour member for the Platting Division of Manchester, a position which lie has occupied ever since. As a speaker, Mr Clynes is good without being brilliant. There is something impressive, however, in the extraordinary intellectual detachment with which he can discuss questions which would arouse many of his fellow “ agitators ” to frenzy. He has great strength of character, an ability and a reasonableness of temperament. MR TOM SHAW With more than a .smattering of many languages. Mr Tom Shaw finds his way about the Continent as easily and jovially as he steers, a strategic course among tlic shoals .and quicksands of the British House of Commons. Ho has the reputation of being a splendid organiser, ono with a consuming passion for uplifting those with whom he is associated. Ills statesmanship is largely of trade union type, but it is stfunch for England and of the solid variety which is so typically English in outlook. It is this side of his character which has made him a dominant figure in the Second International, of which ho was secretary for some time. From the age of twenty-one, when he became a trade union committeeman, Mr Shaw has always held some office or otiru- in the Labour movement. Ile has been secretary of the International Textile Workers, and at ono time was formerly secretary of the Colne Weavers and oi the Northern Counties Textile Trades Federation. He has taken part in many international conferences, both industrial and political. Ho was a member of the Labour - delegation to the Ruhr - , alter which lie went to Berlin cm a. mission. Mr Shaw is on the National Joint Council of the Labour movement, and on tire parliamentary executive of the Party, while outside the movement' bis distinctions include the honour of C.ILE. and a magUtracy, and during the Groat War he was Director of National Services in the West Midland Region. For tire last fonr elections Mr Shaw has headed the poll in the two-momber constituency of Preston. Ho has been a Whip, and was one ol the Labour members of the Holman Gregory Committee on Workmen’s Compensation. His co-operation is valued in the joint efforts of Lancashire members of all parties on behalf oi the cotton industry. His speeches in the House are well constructed and well delivered, and all sides hear with respect his opinions on foreign affairs. Thus by assiduous study and wide rending, with a wonderful knowledge of human nature, has he overcome his carlv educational handicap. MR HOEL BUXTOH ‘‘A tall Elizabethan man” aptly describes the appearance of Mr Noel Buxton. This is justified not only hy his personal appearance, bat in other directions, for Mr Buxton belongs to that high society which is entered when one reads 1 The Faerie Queen ’ or ‘ Westward Ho.’ He might have shared the thoughts and counsels of Sir Philip Sidney or Frank and Amyas Leigh. And that explains why seven years ago he joined the ranks of those who fight for the under-dog. The son of a landowner, he was the first man to advocate in the House of Commons an Agricultural Wages Board. Ho inherited considerable wealth, the hulk of’which he handed over to a trust for public purposes. As chairman of the Balkan Committee and Radical Liberal member for nine years for North, Norfolk, he worked steadily to deter the .Liberal Government from adopting a policy which no said would lead to war. His arguments were set aside, with the consequence that the friendship of Turkey and Bulgaria was lost to the Allies during the war. The Conservative Government sent him to the Balkans in an attempt to intiiienco the policy of the several countries there, but the trouble was done, even though the Bulgarians know him to ho a friend. A street in Sofia bears his name to this day. Rut, and this is not generally known, while Mr Lloyd George and Mr Winston Churchill begged him to go, Sir Edward Grey, the then Foreign .Minister, refused to countenance the mission. Mr Buxton was shot through the jaw hy a fanatical Turk at Bucharest, and it is to hide the scar so caused that he wears a beard. Because ho was declared to lie pro-German lie was defeated in 1918, hut ho was sent hack to Parliament in 1922 for his old constituency as the only Labour member in a wide area of rural Conservatism. As an expert on agriculture as well as on loreign affairs, his presence in the House is valuable to all parties, lie is also a strong advocate ol the League of Nations and the mandates system, and recently wrote and published a Imnk on the subject, 1 Oppressed Peoples and the League of Nations.’

SIR CHARLES TREVELYAN The 11i"lit Hon. Sir Charles Trevelyan, Bart., i.-> the eldest son ol Sir George Trevelyan, whom he succeeded in 1928. Ho sat lirsl in the House ol Commons as a Liberal. He took up a strong position again.it conscription in 19113. In 1922 he was elected Labour M.P. lor N c wcastlo -on-Tync. lie joined Hr Ramsay MacDonald’s Ministry in January of 1921. MR W. ADAMSON The. Light lion. William Adamson is a real product ol the Scottish working classes. The son ol a miner, he was educated at a “village dame” school in Kite, and worked as a miner lor twenty-seven years. He. lias never Inst his Scottish accent, and is the very essence ol caution. He writes all Ins speeches beforehand, and often when he appears to he about to make a strong provocative statements he ends iip in a harmless or pleasant generalisation. He is one of the pioneers ol the trade unionist movement of the West of Scotland, and ho was chairman of the i’afilamentary Labour Party in Hl]7, and again lor three years from 1918. He was Secretary for Scotland during the Labour Administration m 1924, ami during that time mam tested a dee)) interest iu the land question, migration, and education. He is a genial individual, is • a favourite speaker at pleasant Sunday afternoon gatherings lor young men, and he is the type ol man whom one would imagine would seldom lose his temper. Mr Adamson is one of the big figures in the Labour- Party, ami is a groat believer in going to sec conditions lor himself belore criticising them, m order lo make practical suggestions. Kur example, when he was Secretary

for Scotland lie went all over the Hebrides and visited the crofters perEonally—a thing that very few Secretaries or men in Ins position have done before. Ho is a very soft-hearted man, and has a quick sense of injustice to the masses for whom lie speaks. Air Adamson lias sat in Parliament since 1910, when he was first elected for West Fife in the Labour interests, and is now 63 years of age. SIR OSWALD MOSLEY Sir Oswald is ono of a number of politicians who have of recent years turned to the Labour Party for remedial legislation in regard to social evils, but he is different to many of the others in that he is a very wealthy man, and his family, as well as that of his wife, is connected with extensive Conservative interests, so that it must have required a great deal of moral courage to enter tho Labour camp, with tlio eyes of his friends aiid relatives centred upon his every action and word. That ho lias been successful in following the path he has set for himself has been largely duo to tho determined light for what he considers a correct attitude on many modern problems, in which he has received every support from his wife, who is a daughter of the late Marquis Curzon. Sir Oswald Mosley, who only succeeded to tho title during last year, is the sixth baronet of a lino established in 1718, and was educated at Winchester and at tho military college ot Sandhurst. On receiving a commission in tho IGtli Lancers lie served through the Great War, retiring when peace was signed. Since then his career has mostly followed along political lines. He first entered Parliament iu 1919 as Conservative member for the Harrow division of Middlesex, but being dissatisfied with the policy and attitude of his party on certain questions, he contested the seat in 1922 as an Independent, on which occasion ho defeated Lieutenant-colonel C. L. A. Ward-Jackson, an accredited Conservative, by 7,422. Tho following year, still as an Independent, he defeated a Unionist-Conservative candidate in Mr H. Morris by 4,646 votes, but lie did not contest the seat in 1924, in which year ho first espoused the Labour cause. Instead, be stood lor the Ladywood division of Birmingham, running the sitting member, Air Neville Chain-: bcrlain .(a very experienced politician and a member of a historic Birmingham family) to within 77 votes iu an extensive poll of 33,6-11. There is every chance that he would have won on that occasion but for the fact that there was a Liberal candidate, who, securing only 530 votes, upset the position to some extent.

MR F. W. JRWITT At the age of eight Mr Jowitt went to work iu a Bradford textile factory, and ton years later ho became a weaving overlooker, a position which he occupied until he was 28. In 1887, when only 23 years old, he came first into the public eye as a frequent writer to the newspapers, and this eventually led to his devoting the whole of Ids time to public work. Bold agitator and industrious worker, as was evident by a speech made during tho Easter holidays in which he addressed the Independent Labour Party Conference, declaring a “ Right-to-Livo ” war against Id's opponents, his native city of Bradford owes him a great deal. He was elected to the Bradford City Council in 1892, and six years later lie was appointed chairman of the Health Committee, a positi an which ho held without a break for eight years. He led the great fight for school feeding, and won it—directly for Bradford and indirectly for the whole country. He also carried through a scheme for slum clearance and house building, and this twenty-three years ago. * His Parliamentary services started in 190 G, when he was elected for West Bradford. He was defeated :u a pacifist in' 191 S, hut four years later was returned for East Bradford, becoming First Commissioner of Works in Air Ramsay MacDonald's Labour Cabinet. He was again defeated in 1924 by a Liberal in a poll of over 30,000 votes, his opponent having the very small majority of 66. In 1924 lie was made a Privy Councillor, and lie lias been chairman of tho Labom - Party Conference since 1921. Tic has written extensively on Socialist questions, his chief work being ‘ The Socialist and tho City.’

MR F. 0. ROBERTS On one occasion when Mr I’obcrts had talked away Ids voice in expounding Labour policy to the electors of West Bromwich, he brought out his iiddle, and played to thorn. So lie polled mure votes than the Tory and the Liberal put together, and nearly d.UUU more than lie himself polled in 11118, and his majority of k',!147 was “ built to music.” All of which is just like Mr Roberts. He will work in a good cause to the limit of Ids powers. He is just as good in social recreation. And the better lie is known the more he is liked and trusted. Since his first return to Parliament ha lias been chiefly distinguished as an advocate of the pension rights of the ex-scrviccmen, and, indeed, his work in this field had earned the gratitude of thousands. Thousands more—the blind, the oldage pensioners, and the nurses are special instances—have reason for thanking him. He is chairman of the War .Pensions Committee of the Parliamentary Labour Party. He was born in 137(i at Ka.-t Haddon, near Northampton, where his father was a bootmaker, and afterwards shopkeeper and village pistmaster. Starting as an apprentice at Northampton at the age ot thirteen, “ ICO.” worked in the printing trade for twenty-live years, lie became secretary of the Northampton branch of I lie Typographical Association, and eventually reached the positions he still holds as secretary for the Midlands and member of the National Executive of the Association. Ho was lornmriy secretary of the Northampton Labour Party, and his secretaryship for ten years of the Northampton 'I radcs Council was lately recognised by making him an honorary vicepresident ior life. He is on the National Executive of flic Labour Parly, and is a member of flic I.L.P.