MEN IN THE PUBLIC EYE

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 350, 3 February 1937, Page 3

MEN IN THE PUBLIC EYE

A MINISTER OF TRANSPORT KNOWN FOR HIS FAMOUS BEACONS. A FAMOUS NOBEL PRIZE-WINNER.

MR HORE-BELISHA.

Recent promotion of Mr Leslie Hore-Belisha to Cabinet rank does more than restore the balance of British political parties, by conceding to the Liberal Nationals a seat uponjwhich they had a claim in the inner circle of Mr Baldwin’s National Government. In addition, it brings

back to the direct ladder of advancement a distinguished politician who, for patriotic reasons, had temporarily stepped aside to his own immediate disadvantage. When Mt* Leslie Hore-Belisha ‘was transferred from the Treasury to the Ministry of Transport, the change was generally regarded as a setback to his political career. To his friends it came, almost without exception, as

a disappointment. He had been a brilliant success as Financial Secre--4 tary. Though many disliked him — " for, like all ambitious men, he had

made his enemies—yet men of all parties had joined to acknowledge the efficiency and dexterity of his ■work and the impeccable style of his every appearance at the Front Bench. His winding-up speeches on the Budget had been almost faultless in manner and material. Already he had acquired a first-rate Parliamentary reputation. The highest achievement seemed within his reach. The office of Financial Secretary to the Treasury is peculiar to the British Government. It ranks first among all the junior posts and long custom has invested it with the status of next step to the Cabinet. There have been few instances where the holder has not obtained the coveted promotion, and in the present case, if opinion had been canvassed in the House of Commons, nine members out of 10 would have backed Mr Hore-Belisha for the traditional honour in due course. Certainly, he deserved it. But he had further claims. He had played a vital part in the formation of the National Government in 1931. It was he who, at a critical moment in the autumn negotiations, when the Prime Minister's authority was in danger, had presented him with a pledge of support from the National Liberals which enabled him to go to the country. Vfithout that pledge there might have been no National Government.

Mr Hore-Belisha might reasonably have expected that his timely action and the tactical power of the group he represented would be adequately rewarded whep opportunity offered. He had been appointed at the beginning to a junior position in the Board of Trade and later raised to the Treasury. If a further move was to be made, by all the rules it should have been to the Cabinet Instead, he was called one day to the Prime Minister's room and asked to resign his office- for one of lower status. There was no question at that time of the standing of the Ministry of Transport. It was an independent Department, but not the most enthusiastic admirer would have decribed it as of first-class value. Though it dealt with the largest domestic industry in the country, employing no less than £2,000,000,000 of capital and 2,000,000 workpeople, with nfterests extending over 177,000 miles of roads and 20,000 route miles of railways, as well as the natural elfitaents of water and air, ye’t it had remained fn the hands of different Ministers a secondary and littleknown division. The new Minister had the choice either to adopt the Jbird-of-passage attitude of his predecessors, or, having taken on the job, so to vitalise the Department as to make it worthy of his mfettle. In two years he succeeded in lifting the Ministry of Transport to the forefront of British politics.

DR V. F- HESS. The Austrian professor. Dr Victor

F. Hess, who shares the Nobel Prize for physics for. the past year with the American Dr Carl David Anderson. received this distinction for his discovery and study of “cosmic rajs.’’ It was 25 years ago that he made the discovery for which he is now rewarded. Other natural scientists became interested in the subject, so at present he is only one among a number of gifted investigators of cosmic rays. His discovery came from the fact that air is not a constant conductor of electricity. A charged electrometer. when left free in the air, loses its force. Something, the natural. scientists said, neutralises it and thus takes it away. They thought the neutralising agency was radioactive rays from the earth.* But Professor Hess found that in an insulated chamber where rays from the earth cannot penetrate, as well as in the higher atmosphere, where such rays are not so active, this neutralising force still operates. He therefore concluded that it does not come from the earth. To verify this conclusion he made many ascents in balloons during the year 1912 and found that the further he got from the influence of the earth, the more active was the other force. So he felt certain that tie had made the acquaintance of rays coming to our world' from unmeasured distances. He published his disr coveries and conclusions and the natural scientific world lias generally adopted the name “cosmic rays” for this strange agent, which is neither heat nor light, whose nature is unknown, and whose origin is a complete mystery.

The rays have astounding power of penetration and are able to go through two feet of lead or mercury through 1000 feet of water, and to pierce into all secre places, following also has been found to be very great. After long study, it is accepted that they are not wave-like, but corpuscular. So far, cosmic rays have not proved of much practical significance. For all their speed and penetrating power, as yet they light no mines and drive no mills. These strangs rays, that are no one knows where, and pieces into all secret paces, following us indoors and outdoors, day and night, in the heights and depths, are like invisible shadows whose presence appears at present to affect us as little as their absence would. Dr. Hess seems to be what most laymen would, imagine a great natural scientist ought to be. Though enjoying recognition, he has not sought fame. He cares nothing for wealth. His modest professor’s salary (perhaps £4O a month) answers all hiA needs, he said. The prize he has received will be used for further research. His ambition is to serve natural science and not himself. He has two institutes—a small one in Innsbruck, beside the Inn River, and the main one on a mountain towering above the city at an easi'lyaccessible point called Haselekar. The American Rockefeller Institute helped to build them. Every day for five years records of the cosmic rays have been taken. By night and day these rays are made to write their diary, to trace paths, like lightning, on intricate instruments. Many photographs are also taken.

Innsbruck is a centre of some international strife, of a conflict among National Socialists, Marxists, ‘ and Clericals, among Germans, Austrians, and Italians, but Professor Hess is kept above them in his search for the ends of his rays.