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Fifteenth Day. 14 May 1907.
INTERCHANGE OF PERMANENT STAFF.
(Mr. Denkin.)
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inform us of those methods either for our adoption or to enable us to understand the communications that we received. Where this is not possible, we suggest that men of higher standing in the service, when they could be spared, should spend, say, six months in Canada, and then return here for a time, then give six months to South Africa, or some lesser period if that be too long. It need not necessarily be the same officer or officers. By this means a Minister might have the advantage and benefit of having at his elbow then who would be associated with the correspondence and communications relating to these particular Colonies and their constitutions who would be able at once to put him in relatively direct touch with them.
These are only mentioned as some of the means which might be adopted. Some means must be adopted. We feel that this Colonial Oflice The population in its not only has grown but will continue to grow. charge will multiply, its problems will increase in variety. There can be no corresponding increase in the numbers of Ministers or of Parliamentary Under Secretaries of State. More and more therefore must Ministers and Parliamentary Under Secretaries rely upon the permanent officials and more and more is it necessary that those officials should have the opportunity of personal acquaintance with the countries with regard to whose proposals they have so much to say. I am admitting that in Australia itself to understand either the temper of the people, the manner of working our political institutions, or the interpretation that is put upon our constitutional relations is a task of years. It is taking us a considerable time to know ourselves. We are not surprised to discover at this end of the world that because we use the same names as are employed in Great Britain, and often the same procedure, institutions of ours are supposed to be identical with yours, which when examined exhibit marked divergencies. I know no means by which that kind of knowledge can be acquired without personal knowledge.
Of course it would be highly advantageous if a certain number of recruits for the Colonial Office were obtained from time to time from young men born or brought up in Canada, South Africa, or other parts, provided they came at an age which allowed them time to become identified with the Colony. If the Colonial Office is to That is not a matter for me to dwell upon.
continue to occupy its present relations to all these various Dominions it is perfectly certain that as its responsibilities increase its equipment must increase also, and in that new equipment a conspicuous place, we venture to suggest, should be given to men who speak from personal knowledge, and who deal with distant countries with whom they sympathise after making themselves familiar with the facts upon which they are called upon advise.
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It must be remembered that as years go on the number of the men in the Dominions who were born in Great Britain and are acquainted with its political and social conditions tends to diminish. Our fathers, of course, were Britons, most of them of full age before they entered either Canada, Australia, or South Africa; but our new generation, growing up under very different conditions from those which obtain in this country, has not that knowledge. It is only natural to expect therefore that they will take somewhat different roads, and that they not only will be less understood themselves, but will understand less what is really meant by many of the objects and procedures which are accepted as quite customary in this country.
I do not desire to labour the point. I have put it already in a number of different ways, and could put it in many more. It appears to me that, from our point of view at all events, a case is made out for laying before the Secretary of State for the Colonies the suggestion that some scheme for bringing his officers into direct touch with us should be adopted, and is indeed essential to secure efficiency.
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Then there is the further set of circumstances hardly touched upon by that Resolution which relates to the Colonial Office. There remains to be mentioned the new Secretariat which we conceived as a kind of Imperial office, charged with knowledge of and responsibility for all the great self- governing Dominions, and concerned with the oversight of a great variety of Imperial interest. These might be concentrated in such a Secretariat, instead of being, as they now are, divided over several departments in this country, to which would be added other questions hardly yet associated. I do not propose to do more than recapitulate some of the more familiar. I do not know, my Lord, in shaping a departmental Secretariat, how far you will take this into your consideration; but I hope you will weigh the necessity of keeping our Dominions in closer touch with external questions that particularly affect them, even when they may not be coming forward for immediate treatment? I might mention the case of Alaska in regard to Canada, and the New Hebrides, and Pacific interests in our case; and of Delagoa Bay in South Africa. These have arisen in the past. But it is easy to see, being wise after the event, how much better qualified the Empire would have been for consistent action in regard to those matters, if they had been objects of study before the crisis arose, or if, as and when the crisis arose, Canada, Australia, or South Africa or all of them had been kept informed of the state of those problems and the difficulties that had to be encountered in settling them. I might develop these possibilities at great length, but the case appears to me to be plain enough as it stands. There are many matters still at issue of deep interest to Canada, for instance, or South Africa, upon which this office possesses or can obtain much knowledge, which would be of great value to Canada or South Africa as the case might be. Part of it would be confidential; but to have these problems kept in view, and to have them from time to time presented to us in their new phases, would save many possible misunderstandings, and enable proposals to be made from the Dominion affected which might often be useful to the Colonial Office.
The next suggestions were summarised a short time ago in an article by Mr. Drage in the "Fortnightly Review," in which he pointed out that a study of other colonial systems generally, first of all, and then in regard He said that to a particular problem or problems might be of much use.
the French in Northern Africa, the Germans in Eastern Africa, and the United States in the Philippines were conducting a number of very interesting experiments. Some of those, it occurs to me, are climatic, and some relate to health. Those, I am aware, the Colonial Office has, to a con- siderable extent, dealt with, but others relate to their products and their methods of government, upon which valuable information could be found. Foreign blue books, it is said, are not laid as freely under contribution in this regard-the French, Germans, and Italians are mentioned in particular as they might well be.
I omitted to mention that among the questions upon which, for instance, it would be a great gain if from time to time we were kept in touch with such proposals as were lately made, in regard to important action in Madeira, and similar tendencies elsewhere, portending to the acquisition of territory by other powers. We have lately been brought face to face with ourselves, with want of knowledge of Treaty obligations, of how far we are really bound as Dominions, and how far we have been committed. I am aware that steps are being taken to mitigate this. But that experience suggests other directions in which the same course can be followed with advantage. Of course, in trade affairs, there are a great variety of directions in which the article, to which I have referred, points out our needs. For instance, Mr. Drage says there is at common statistical year, no present no common statistical method, no
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Fifteenth Day.
14 May 1907.
INTERCHANGE OF PERMANENT STAFF.
(Mr. Deakin.)