BRITAIN’S NEW LEADER

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVIII, Issue 23265, 28 July 1945, Page 4

BRITAIN’S NEW LEADER

Clement R. Attlee Tory Who Became Socialist Clement Richard Attlee, who now heads Lie first British Labour Government with an absolute majority in the House of Commons, was described recently by a correspondent of tin “Sydney Morning (ii raid" as a victim of his own modesty and diffidence. He does not lack fine qualities, but he lacks mildence; he has no fire, but he mis faith; he takes pains, but he causes pain to some of his friends. Mr Attlee has been called the impeccable cnairman. He has the rare laculty of putting forward points well and simply. Puffing at his pipe, he conveys an impression of stolidity, and is just the man to preside over a gathering when nerves are frayed and tempers short. Paradoxically, if you were to have seen him at a Cabinet meeting you would have noticed that he would be sitting on the edge of his chair. The trick is typical. It advertises his personality—the personality of a man who was born to fill in the background of any scene in which he might figure. ore of his severer critics once said of him that he was “like a point, which has position but no magnitude.” The remark was apt, for Clement Attlee is the honest broker, the good man, the loyal man —but he has little magnitude, either of spirit or temperament. Middle-Class Product Mr Attlee was “brought up” in a comfortable, middle-class environment. Born in 1883, the fourth son of Henry Attlee, of Westcott, Putney, he was educated at Haileybury College and University College, Oxford. In his yciuh he was a Tory, but more by convention than conviction. Not until he had been some time at Oxford did he turn to the Left, and then at first only tentatively. His w’as the socialism of the Fabians, the respectable kind preached by such as Bernard Shaw, H. G. Wells and the Webbs. For a while he read law. Subsequently he was secretary of Toynbee Hall and a tutor and lecturer in social science at the London School of Economics. Having made it his business to learn how the poor lived and endured, he stumped the country explaining tile great Minority Report of the Poor Law Commission and National Health Insurance. Emotionally he discovered himself to be an East Ender. Intellectually he had to acknowledge that he was better as teacher than preacher. Last War Soldier

When war came in 1914 there was a military interlude. He served as a soldier because of his sense of duty—that stern sense w’hich still activates him tn all he says and does. As subaltern, captain and major, he “did his bit” unspectacularly, but efficiently, fighting at Gallipoli, in Mesopotamia and France. And when the war was over he reaped what he had sown before it. In 1919. 16 London boroughs “went Labour.” As Mayor of Stepney he inevitably took the chair—chairman of the London Labour Mayors’ Association. Three years afterward he became M.P. for Limehouse, and in 1923 was Under-Secretary for War. Nevertheless, then and for years to come, he was completely overshadowed by others, including George Lansbury, just as it is his fate to-day to be overshadowed by colleagues whose flair for publicity he lacks. But that did not prevent him going to India in 1927 with the Simon Commission, nor his successive appointments as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Post-master-General. In the crisis of 1931 Cl-men’ Attlee proved his mettle as a Socialist. He cut" with Arthur Henderson, Civnes and William Graham. To high places filled by such as Rtr.:sav MtcDontld and Jimmy Thomas. To him. too. it came as no surprise that I at th n< xt general election the Labour Party was decimated. Yet from that defest emerged ’• - opportunity—he was made deputy-Lcadsr cf the Parliamentary Party, and then, in 1935, on Len.-bury’s resignation, acting-Leader. When'the party was offered a choice between Herbert Morrison. Arthur Greenwood and Attlee, it chose Attlee to be its leader —Clem Attlee, the known quantity, the man who would not perform political gymnastics the man it trusted through and through. The party knew he was not ambitious as Ramsay MacDonald had been. It knew, also, that he would be acceptable to the country. Above all, it knew that being neither a bigot nor a doctrinaire, the new leader would put the whole before the parts—that he would be a true party man, not a partisan. Widely read, witty in a subdued fashion. Mr Attlee has shown more than once that when provoked he can be waspish in debate. Generally, however. his verbal assaults in the House have been too literary, too polished, to please some of the wilder men in his following. These gentry would like to see him a trifle more Bevinish. But he remains what he is—primarily a trained intellect and only secondarily a leader. Went His Quiet Way

Of thin figure, he is also thin of voice. That. too. is one of his handicaps. It explains, perhaps, why. when he is about to make a speech, he invariably suffers from “nerves.” Under the mighty shadow of Churchill he went his quiet way during the critical war years, always steadfast and always content to be out of the headlines. He officiated as a chairman for the humdrum, essential work of Government, entirely happy because he had a flair for making men work together amid the tangled counsels and discontents of a National Administration. While Winston Churchill was industriously waging war. Clement Attlee was industriously keeping the peace behind the lines. He was the co-ordma-tor. He got things done —without fuss. On one occasion when he was asked wliv he was a Labour man he said the Labour Party was the only one in his opinion capable of producing sane order in society, of creating a newer and brighter world. In this he betrayed his idealism But those who know him best win tell you that with this idealism he combines a vigorous practical outlook.