DAYS OF NEGLECT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 October 1941, Page 5

DAYS OF NEGLECT

INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT OF B.E.F. FIERCE ATTACK ON BRITISH MINISTERS. 1 DEMANDS FOR GREATER HELP FOR RUSSIA. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 10.20 a.m.) LONDON, October. 26. A demand for the punishment of the Ministers responsible for the inadequate equipment of British forces that were in France and Belgium was :made by Mr E. Clement Davies, K.C. (L.-Nat. M.P. for Montgomeryshire) in an address to ithe Cambridge Liberal Club. After quoting from Lord Gert’s dispatches, Mr Davies said that if the men responsible had disappeared, or were dead, as were many of the soldiers and airmen concerned, it could have been said that the chapter was closed, but thd men responsible still held high office. ) / Sir Kingsley Wood, who said that the number of planes accruing to the Allies was equal that of the Axis, had been promoted Chancellor of the Exchequer and placed again in the War Cabinet. “Sir Samuel Hoare, who at one time was responsible for the Air Ministry, is now Ambassador to Spain,” Mr Davies continued. “Viscount Simon also is in the War Cabinet and is Lord High Chancellor. The two in the War Office have gone—Messrs Hore-Belisha and Oliver Stanley. The public will demand an inquiry into the stewardship of these men and should the inquiry reveal that they failed in their duty to the armed forces of the country, they should be punished. The Government should be purged of such men. Only now, two years after the outbreak of war and three years after Munich, has the Government discovered it is short of tanks.” Miss E. C. Wilkinson (Lab. M.P. for Jarrow division of Durham) was unable to make herself heard before 10,000 Labour demonstrators in Trafalgar Square. Demands for a western front offensive and shouts of: “Take her away!” drowned her voice. Resolutions were carried, pressing for a complete fulfilment of the Government’s assurances to Russia and also for the removal of the ban on the “Daily Worker.” The meeting ended with cheers for Russia and the singing of the “Red Flag.”