THE BRITISH CABINET.

Hokitika Guardian, 14 March 1924, Page 4

THE BRITISH CABINET.

WHO’S WHO. Below are some personal notes of Mr Ramsay MacDonald’s Ministers. The salaries are those received by Ministers holding the same offices in Mr Baldwin’s Cabinet: — Mr Ramsay MacDonald, M.P.— Prime Minister and Foreign Sec. £5.1)00. The Prime Minister was born at Lossiemouth, on the Elgin coast, in 18(3(5. When 1!) he migrated to London and became a warehouse clerk at a weekly wage of 12s Gd. Having joined the newly created Independent Labour Party in 1894, lio stood as Independent Labour Party candidate for Southampton in 1895 hut was defeated. The election, however. brought him into touch with his ,'uiure wife. Miss .Margaret F.thel Gladstone, a niece of Lord Kelvin, who unknown to him, had sent him a cheque to help liiin in his fight. They were married in November isf!(3 and Mrs MacDonald proved herself of the greatest: assistance to her husband's eareer. Tier dentil in 1911 was a severe blow to him, and left him with five voting children to bring

11 j »- Mr MacDonald, who has travelled wiilelv in various parts of the Empire, was in 1912 appointed a member of the Royal Commission which went to Lidia to report on the public services. His pacifist altitude during the war—he was one of the founders of the Union of Democratic Control lost him iniudi of his popularity and prestige. but be re-entered Parliament in 192-2.

Mr .1. R. dynes, M.P., Lord Privy Seal and Deputy Lender H. 0.0., to.ooo. —Mr John Robert dynes is a Privy Councillor and the member for Platting, Manchester. Born in 1890, the son of an Oldham Corporation labourer, be began work in a cotton mill when be was 10. lie studied passionately, rising to go to his books by sunrise, and returning to them by candle-light when his work was done. He is president of the National Union of General Workers, and chairman of the Federation of General 'Workers. He succeeded Lord Rhondda as Food Controller in 19ld.

Lord Parmoor, Lord President oi the Council. to,ooo.—Charles Alfred Cripps, first Baron Parmoor, was born in ls-32 and educated at Winchester and New College. Oxford. In 1877 he was called to the Bar. becoming a o.c. in isnn.

Before being raised to the Peerage

and becoming a member of the Judicial Committee of. the Privy Council. Mr Cripps had sat in Parliament as a Conservative or Unionist for many vears.

An ardent Churchman, he was Vicar-General of the diocese ol Canterbury in 1902. HU first wife was a sister of Mrs Sidney Webb. Viscount Haldane, Lord Chancellor,

Cl 0,000. —Richard Bunion Haldane was born in 1 Sod and educated at Edinburgh and Gottingen Universities. He was M.P. for Haddingtonshire from 1885 till 1011, in which latter year he was raised to the Peerage. He was Secretary of State for War from 190.7-12 and Lord High Chancellor from 1912-15.

Li former times Lord Haldane belonged to the Imperialistic wing of the Liberal Party. Ilis devotion to Herman philosophy has always been marked and he has written several learned books showing strong traces of the iiiHuoneo of German thought. It was prohablv l his sympathy that led him tn be chosen by Mr Asquith early in 1912 to proceed on a mission to Berlin to ••sound" the German Government with a view to a mutual abatement, of armaments.

Although this object was not attained. Lord Haldane's previous work of reorganisation at the War Ollice had put tlie British Army in a position to take the field instantly when the Herman on-lunghl came in 1911.

M.r Philip Snowden, AI.P.. Chancellor of the Exchequer. £5.1)1)11. —Mr Philip Snowden was burn tit Cowling, Yorkshire, iu 18(51. and at the ago of 22 entered the Civil Service.

An injury received in a bicycle accident seven years later compelled bint to resign, and the books be tend during liis disablement turned him from a Liberal into a Socialist. He was elected member for Blackburn in 190(1. and hold the seat, till BBS. when lie lost it on acoutil ol bis pacifist attitude

during the war. Air Snowdon, who lias written eon sidorablv oil social ami economic (pit's, tiotis, is a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society.

Air Arthur Henderson, Home Secretary. £s,ol)o.—Mr Arthur Henderson litis born in Glasgow iu 1-8153; served

bis apprenticeship as a moulder in Newcastle. In 1903 lie entered the

House of Commons as member for Barnard Castle, Durham, and held the seat till 19D. in 1919 he became member for the Widncs division, and from 19.22-3 represented Newcastle East, lie lost bis seat at the last election, but he was recently returned I,v a large majority to represent Burnlev.

Mr Henderson lias .served on many Government and public committees and Royal Commissions. He was a member of the Government during part of the war, member of the Cabinet War Committee 191(5-17, and of the Government Alission to Russia in 1917, in which year he and Air Lloyd George quarrelled. Air Henderson, who was made a Privy Councilolr in 1915, is a A\ esleyan and an abstainer. Two of bis sons entered Parliament at- the recent election.

Mr .1. if. Thomas, M.L’.. Colonial Secretary, Co,ooo. -Mr James Henry Thomas was horn at Newport, Mon., in ISr;?, and at the age of nine began work as an errand boy. Later he joined the Great Western .Railway as tin engine cleaner and rose to ho driver of an express. He has heen, in turn, organiser

Assistant-secretary, general secretary, and president of tlic National I'nion of Railwayman. ITo has boon a member of Parliament for Derby since 1910. During the war his pro-Ally sympathies were marked, and in 1917 he accompanied Mr Balfour on his official mission to l nited States.

Mr Stephen Will'll. M .P.. Secretary for War. fco.OnO. Mr Walsli. member for the luce Division. Lancs, since li'Oo. has hecii agent of the Lancashire anti Cheshire Miners’ Federation since IDOI. In 1922 lie was vice-president of the Miners’ Federation. He was horn in Liverpool in 1809. At 14 he began his 18 years’ work as a coalminer. From 1017 to 1010 he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Local

Government Hoard. Early in the war he, with his colleagues of the Lancashire Miners’ Federation, helped to raise the Pioneer Battalions. His son joined one of these battalions and was killed.

Sir Sydney Olivier, Secretary lor India, lh) ,000. Sir Sydney Olivier, musician, poet, and Fabian essayist-, is a retired Civil Servant. Born in 1800 and educated at Lausanne, Tonbridge School, and Corpus College, Oxford, he entered the Colonial Office in 1882. After holding appointments in British Honduras and the Leeward Islands he was appointed a member of the West India Royal Commission. In 1913, on leaving the Governorship of Jamaica, for which the salary was .0.8.000, he accepted the post of Permanent Secretary of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries at a salary

coloured labour questions. Brig-Gen. Christopher Thomson, Air Secretary, JL‘3,OOO. General Thomson, who is not an M.P., was British Military Representative on the Supremo War Council, 1918-19. Ho joined the Army in 1894, served in the South African campaign, and went to France on the Staff of the Ist Army Corps under Lord Haig. He headed Military Missions to Rumania and Russia and his brigade was the first to enter Jerusalem.

Viscount Chelmsford, First Lord of the Admiralty, £5,000. Frederic John Napier Thesiger, third Baron and first Viscount Chelmsford, was born in 1808 and educated at Winchester and Oxford. He became Governor of Queensland in 1905, and in 1009 Governor of New South Wales. From 1910 to 1921 lie was Viceroy of India and his handling of the situation during these difficult years showed calmness and vision.

Mr Sidney Webb, M.P., President of t.lie Board of Trade, £5,000. Air Sidney Webb, who was horn in London in 1859, may be called the father of the Socialist Party. He was the principal founder, in 1884. of the Fabian Society, a Socialist organisation which has done much propaganda work.

Mr Webb, who was educated in London. Switzerland, and Atncklen-hurg-Scliwerin, was a clerk iu a Colonial broker’s office 1875-8, and a Civil Servant 1878-91. From 1892 to 1910 he was a member of the London Countv Council.

In 1892 Mr Webb married -Miss Beatrice Potter, who had helped in tile foundation of the Fabian Society, and the two have collaborated in tiro authorship of many learned volumes on economies and social problems. Mr Webb was the principal founder of the London School of Economics. Mr John Wheatley. ALP., Minister 0 f (Health, £3,000. Mr Wheatley, who represents Shettlestoii, Glasgow, is a child of the slums—one of 11 persons. as lie told the House of Cornmens, who lived for years in a singlernomed apartment in Lanarkshire. From the age of 12 until he was 22 he worked in coal mines. He is now in business in Glasgow as a publisher. Mr Wheatley used to lead the Labour group in the Glasgow Town Council.

Mr Noel Buxton, M.P., Minister of Agriculture. £5.000. Mr Buxton lias devoted his life In helping Balkan peoples to throw oil' the Turkish yoke, (in the outbreak ol war lie and bis brother. Mr Roden Buxton, visited the capitals of all the Balkan States in the interest of the Allies. A A omig Turk fanatic attempted to assassinate the brothers while they were motoring in Bncarest. Mr Buxton was shot through the jaw, his brother through the lung.

Mr Buxton, born iu 1809, was educated at Harrow and Cambridge, and has written many books on Near Fast problems and polities. He relinquished hi- parliamentary salary lor reasons of “private and national economy" during the war. Mr W. Adamson, M. 8., Secretary for .Scotland, £2,500. Mr William Adamson. M.P. lor West bite since 1910. began orwk at II and for 27 vears worked in a mine.

After the war he became Chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party. In 1920 he presided over the party's demonstration —the Council of Action —during the threat of war between Poland and the Bolsheviks. In the autumn of the same year hr and Mr Gosling, the delegates of the Council of Action, were expelled from Paris, whither they had gone to promote opposition to war. Mr Charles Trevelyan. M.P. President Board of Education. C3JHMI. Mr Charles Philins Trevelyan is the eldest sou of Sir G. O. Trevelyan, Bart., wlm was Chief Secretary for Ireland in ]SB’2. He was horn in Park-lane in 187(1.

Educated at Harrow anil Cambridge, he entered Parliament for the Klland Division in LUO and held the seat till BMS. lie was Parliamentary Chanty Commissioner from 190'! to 1908, and Parliamentary Secretary, Board of Education, I. tie resigned from the Government at the outbreak oi tile European war and became one of the founders oi the Fiiinn of Democratic Control. llis pacifist attitude brought him great mipnpula lity. Mr T. Shaw. ALP.. Minister of Labour, C‘2,000. Mr Thomas Shaw was horn at Colne in 1879. ITe speaks French and German fluently and lias studied the Continental Labour movement and met its loaders oil the spot. At the age of 10 he started as a halftimer and worked for 10 years in a cotton mill. Since then lie has been a trade union official. In succession to Mr TLim-av MacDonald, lie was elected, in 1992, secretary of the Second I n tcrnai iniial. Mr Shaw visited Russia in 1920. He found Lenin “in-len.-.clv disappointing.” Colonel .losiiili Wedgwood, ALP., Chamellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. 172,000. Colonel Wedgwood was born at Barlaston. Staffordshire, in am! educated at Clifton and the Royal Naval College, Greenwich. He captained the Elswiek Battery, R.F.A.. in the South African War. 1809-1902. From 1902-1 he was Resident .Magistrate at Ei inelo. in the Transvaal. In IfMit! lie was elected M.R. lor Xew-castle-under-Lyiiie, and this seat he has kept ever since, although he left tlie Liberal for the Labour Party in 1919. Colonel Wudgwood gained the 8.5.0. in Gallipoli in I9IA, where he was wounded. He also served at Antwerp. ill France, and in Easl .Africa, and went on a mission to Siberia in 1918. Mr F. W. Jowtct, ALP., First Commissioner of Works, (72,000. Mr .fowett. who was born at Bradford in 1801, was chairman of the Labour Party. 1922-2.3, and is a member of the executive. At the age of Bho went to work as a half-timer in a textile factory. In 1892 lie was elected to the Bradford City Council, and was for many years chairman of the Health Committee. ITe has been a consistent advocate of municipal Socialism, and took a leading part in securing the provision of school meals for necessitous children.