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that similar steps should now be taken to look at the forecasts of social services expenditure and consider what steps can be taken to moderate its growth.

6.

Major cuts in expenditure require major changes of policy and, apart from items like the remaining food subsidies (which have been included in the present survey), major changes in policy will be slow to fructify in such cuts, If we are to produce significant results during the present Parliament we must start in good time. And if unpleasant decisions have to be taken,

the earlier in our period of office we take them, the less difficult they will be.

7. I do not, of course, ask for any decisions on policies at the present moment. But I suggest that the Cabinet should now appoint a small Committee of Ministers to consider the attached five-year survey and to report to the Cabinet what changes of policy would be necessary to secure an appreciable reduction in the rate at which this social services expenditure is expected to grow.

8. If such a Committee is, as I hope it may be, set up forthwith, among the material which it will need to take into account is the Guillebaud Report on the National Health Services, on which no doubt it will be necessary for the Government to make a statement when the Report is published or when the House reassembles.

Treasury Chambers, S. W.1.

2nd December, 1955.

R.A.B.

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