OUT OF CABINET

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19933, 31 August 1927, Page 9

OUT OF CABINET

LORD CECIL RESIGNS States Reason as Failure of Disarmament Conference DISAGBEES WITH COLLEAGUES (By Telegraph—Per Press Assn.—Copyright.) (A. & N.Z.) LONDON, Aug .29. Viscount Cecil has resigned his seat in the Cabinet. In a letter dated August 25 he says: I wrote to you on August 9 immediately on my return from Geneva to tell you I felt it impossible to continue in office. Owing to your absence in Canada I understand that letter has only just reached you. I t-.yue therefore, re-stated in the form of a minute, which I now enclose, my reasons for resignation. In the accompanying minute Viscount Cecil says: “I am sorry to say 1 have arrived at the conclusions that I ought to resign my office. Let me in the first place asusre you that this conclusion is not due to any personal difficulty. On the contrary, 1 feel that I owe you and all my colleagues much gratitude for your kindness and consideration. ‘‘The difficulty is, I am sorry to say, much more serious, for I cannot conceal from myself that on the broad policy of disarmament the majority of the Cabinet and I are not really agreeing. I am convinced that no considerable limitation of armaments can be obtained except by international agreement. On the attainment of such an agreement, therefore, in my judgment the chief energies of the Government ought to be concentrated.

“When you were good enough to ask me to be one of the British represented tives at the recent Geneva conference I gladly accepted. I thought there was little doubt of an agreement being reached, and I believed an agreement, between the three great naval Powers for the reduction of their armaments would be of great assistance in facilitating the efforts of the Preparatory Commission for a general limitation. Unfortunately failure followed, and the causes of that failure may have to be probed when Parliament meets. It is enough now 'to say that I found myself out of sympatny with the instructions I received, and I believe that an agreement might have been reached on terms which would have sacrificed no essential British interest

“In each case the policy I advocated has been more or less completely overruled. As it has been in the past, so it will be in the future. The same causes will produce similar effects, for the truth is, however unwilling I am to recognise it, that in these matters my colleagues do not agree with me. “I can see no way, then, in which I can be of further service in the Cabinet to the cause which I regard as supremely important. But outside there is much to be done. The hope of the future lies in an aroused and instructed public opinion. CONCERN AT GENEVA EFFECT ON LEAGUE’S WORK “A SERIOUS BLOW” Received Aug. 30, 8 p.m. (A. & N.Z.) LONDON, Aug. 30. The Morning Post’s Geneva correspondent reports that high League officials express the opinion that it would be a serious blow if Viscount Cecil’s resignation were to entail his dissociation from League work, especially as it follows that of M. De Jouvcnel (France).