THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES MONDAY, May 31, 1937. THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23204, 31 May 1937, Page 8

THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES MONDAY, May 31, 1937. THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT

The suggestion, which has been on various occasions made at Home, that Mr Neville Chamberlain would, on his assumption of the office of Prime Minister, make several changes in the composition of the Government will have been founded partly in hppe and partly in expectation. There is a number of younger members of Parliament, on the Ministerial side of the House of Commons, who have shown so much promise that it has been argued that some of the older occupants of office might, with advantage to the country, have been required to make way for them. In the most recent issue of the Spectator that we have received, the statement is confidently made that Mr Chamberlain's arrival at the position of Prime Minister would "mean that the Cabinet changes not merely its name but its character." Mr Chamberlain has, however, not thought fit at this stage to change the Ministerial team to any appreciable degree. Three members of Mr Baldwin's Cabinet have retired—two of them through their acceptance of peerages —but Mr Chamberlain is retaining the services of all the others, and, as he has reduced the number that constitutes the Cabinet from 21 to 20, this left only two vacancies in that higher branch of the Government. One of them is filled by the promotion of Dr Burgin, who was previously Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade, to the office of Minister of Transport, and the other by the appointment of Earl de la Warr to the office of Lord Privy Seal, previously held by Viscount Halifax. While the personnel of the Cabinet has thus undergone little change, there has been a redistribution of offices to an extent that has—not unreasonably, it would seem—excited surprised comment. Sir John Simon is transferred from the Home Office to the Chancellorship of the Exchequer, Sir Samuel Hoare from the Admiralty to the Home Office, Mr Duff-Cooper from the War Office to the Admiralty, Mr Hore-Belisha from the Ministry of Transport to the War Office. Mr Oliver Stanley from the office of President of the Board of Education to the Board of Trade, and Earl Stanhope from the office of First Commissioner of Works (no longer to be associated with a seat in the Cabinet) to the Education Office. Mr Chamberlain has, it will be observed, not provided any Ministerial office for Mr Winston Churchill, one of the ablesl and mosl entertaining debater? in the House, whose prospects of securing a place in the Government must, however, have been impaired by the attitude which he adopted during the abdication crisis last year The reshuffling' of Ministerial post? that has occurred is suggestive of a former drawing-room game which was known as " musical chairs." and it i c certainly curious that il should have been considered by Mr Cham-

berlain to be desirable at the present time. While the change in the presidency of the Board of Trade was rendered inevitable by the elevation of Mr Runciman to the House of Lords, the delegates to the Imperial Conference will share the feeling of surprise that the War Office and the Admiralty should have changed hands within a few days after they had been addressed by Mr Duff-Cooper and Sir Samuel Hoare respectively representing those highly important departments of State. As it cannot possibly be imagined that the departmental policy will not be continued, the appointment in each case of a Minister who is new to his office is the more remarkable. The opinion which is expressed in our cabled messages that trouble awaits the reconstructed Government is, of course, a reflection of the dissatisfaction in certain financial circles with the national defence taxation scheme. The opposition aroused by the company tax proposals would have had to be faced by Earl Baldwin, if he had remained in office, and it is probable that he would have met it more successfully than Mr Chamberlain will, because it may be doubted whether the new Prime Minister possesses the peculiar qualifications that were exhibited by his predecessor for handling difficult political situations. The legacy of the special defence of the defence taxation has, however, been accepted by Sir John Simon, and it may be anticipated that his dialectical skill will be fully exercised in justifying the large demand which the Government is making on industry. ■