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flow of real debate was almost wholly absent, and we were treated to one prepared speech after another something that from parliamentarians was not a little suprising.
18.
It is difficult for an observer to assess the value of these annual parliamentary gatherings; but it probably lies less in the quality of the actual debates than in the personal contact that they provide between members of parliaments through the length and breadth of the Commonwealth and the wider understanding of one another's problems that this engenders - in other words, as so often with the Commonwealth, it is the intangible benefits that matter.
19. It clearly remains right that the UK delegation should be led by a minister. It was unfortunate that this year, because of the late change in the leadership and a flight delay, Mr Blaker missed both the opening day of the conference and the final day. On the other hand, he was able to devote much of the Friday (when the CPA were dealing with domestic business) to a series of useful bilateral calls on the Prime Minister, the Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Leader of the Opposition and, earlier in the week, gave a luncheon address to the Wellington Press Club. On the Thursday he was able to make some visits out of Wellington.
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20. Moving at the end of the conference what was very much more than a formal vote of thanks, Sir Arnott Cato, President of the Barbados Senate, paid tribute to our New Zealand hats, commenting particularly on the warmth with which the delegates had been received by New Zealanders, official and private, both in Wellington and in the admirably-organised tours preceding the conference. His sentiments would have been strongly endorsed by everyone. The friendships made, moreover, had been reflected in the sorrow which delegates had shared with all New Zealanders at the tragedy of the DC-10 crash in Antarctica which had taken place in the middle of the conference and had cast a shadow over everything.
21.
The 1980 conference is to be hosted (in late September/ early October) by Zambia - who, after the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, seem gluttons for punishment. Commenting on this in the opening session, the Zambian Deputy Speaker remarked that Zambia would hope to make CPA delegates' stay there "exciting and enjoyable". We should perhaps hope that the latter description will be more apposite than the former.
Commonwealth Co-ordination Department
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
December 1979
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