The Southland Times FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 1942. The Passing of the War Council

Southland Times, Issue 24822, 14 August 1942, Page 4

The Southland Times FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 1942. The Passing of the War Council

THE career of the War Council, which has now been quietly terminated, will occupy only a very small chapter in the political history of the war years. It began on June 18, 1940, when the Prime Minister announced the personnel of the newly-appointed council, which he said would “supervise and direct the Dominion’s war effort.” This somewhat ambitious claim was never fulfilled in practice. The real significance of the appointment lay in the fact that the council was the first substitute for a coalition ministry. Its political value was negligible. The Opposition was invited to nominate three members, but would have nothing to do with it, failing to see it as the instrument of political unity. It is worth noting, however, that the council was used as the facade for a major development in war policy. On June 22, 1940, the new body held its first meeting and made a number of proposals which amounted, in effect, to the introduction of conscription. The administrative machinery to implement this important change of policy was already in existence, and had probably been prepared long before the council was appointed. It was obvious, therefore, that the council was merely performing the function of a rubber stamp. That was the only occasion when its name was associated with anything which could be described as the “supervision” of the war effort. Later, when the War Cabinet added a new wing to the curious constitutional structure, it declined gently to an advisory capacity. Its meetings became infrequent, and although the Prime Minister conscientiously directed attention to them the public was never able to take them very seriously. This was no fault of the members, who acted throughout on a voluntary basis, and who certainly did what they could to perform a useful service to the community. Their efforts were nullified from the beginning; they were the victims of a makeshift. The formation of the War Administration gave the council its final push towards oblivion. In the last phase of its existence the Dominion’s war effort had an extraordinary framework. The domestic Cabinet, the War Cabinet, the War Administration and the War Council were like monuments strewn along the road to a unified executive. Now that the council has been removed the system is less unwieldy. But there is still room for improvement. The War Administration has shown encouraging signs of vitality. Some of the new Ministers have had a hand in preparing recent measures which may help to straighten out the tangle of war regulations. (The lifting of the black-out in country districts is a case in point.) If there have been difficulties behind the scenes, the public has heard nothing about them. It is possible to hope that members of the Administration who also belong to the domestic Cabinet will tend increasingly to act in their new capacity. If that happens there might be a gradual process of assimilation, a process which would be generally welcomed. There are few administrative problems which now could be said to belong exclusively to domestic affairs. The war touches every department of national life; it is the central and dominating fact. Of every four members of Parliament, one is a Minister, with or without portfolio. In these circumstances the ordinary Cabinet should become a vestige of former times. Like the War Council, it should be allowed to fade out of existence. Unfortunately, however, it has one function which seems certain to guarantee its survival. It is the parliamentary citadel of the Labour Party, the instrument of party control; and it retains the substance of an executive power which filters in diluted forms into the War Administration. The War Council has gone; but it leaves behind it a system of control that has the unwieldiness and blurred outline of a compromise. All that can be said is that part of the scaffolding has been removed from the unshapely edifice. To look for further changes might be a baseless optimism.