95

A.—4

-25 May, 1911.] Reconstitution of the Colonial Office. [2nd Day. The PRESIDENT— cont. ions should be put directly under the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. I earnestly hope that that suggestion will not be pressed. I do not know whether you realise that the office of Prime Minister in the United Kingdom is not a sinecure. I would doubt very much whether there are many people in the world who have more things on their shoulders, and I really could not, nor could anybody holding my office, conscientiously deal with what is suggested. I should be only a figurehead, and it would be a fraud to represent the Prime Minister as really honestly dealing with the work of the Dominions Department. I have some figures here which are rather instructive. For the year 1910 the correspondence of the Dominions division of the Colonial Office shows : Despatches received, 6,043; sent out, 6,028. Domestic letters received, 5,310; sent out, 6,501. That is 23,882. Besides those there is a share belonging to the Dominions Department of other papers, giving a total of 27,000. lam told of those at least 1,000 had to be seen by the Secretary of State. I could not do that work, and it is no good pretending I could, nor could any one in my position. Therefore I hope that this particular resolution will not be pushed forward. It is not from any disposition to shirk it, or indisposition to take upon myself any necessary duties, but because it could not be done; and I expect all my fellow Prime Ministers would agree with me in that. Mr. HARCOURT : Sir Joseph Ward has asked me to say a word on his second resolution, in which he suggests a change of title for the Secretary of State. I think " The Secretary of State for Imperial Affairs," would obviously be unsuitable for any office which did not include India. It would indeed be an assumption which would be impossible. The only change I can imagine is that he should be called " The Secretary of State for Dominions, Crown Colonies, and other Possessions," and that is not a very handy title. Unless there is any serious objection to the old word " Colony " you will find that the English people, without attaching any derogatory meaning to the word " Colony," have an affection for the old title. A change could only be made by Act of Parliament, and it could not be made ad hoc, but there would have to be amendments in other Acts to bring them under the new title. Sir JOSEPH WARD :I do not want to press it. Ido not want to have a handle to your name which is too difficult for people to transcribe. The PRESIDENT : I think the best plan would be for us to circulate a short memorandum explaining the suggestion of the Standing Committee—not a proposal, because we are not proposing it in any way—and then on a later day we can come to a final decision on the subject. Mr. HARCOURT : The other resolutions as to interchange of civil servants we can conveniently leave for a day when we have some spare time, because I shall be prepared to deal with it at any time when the discussion has been shorter than expected, and we can thus relieve the agenda for to-day. To-morrow the Conference, by its own wish and at the invitation of the Prime Minister, will meet the Committee of Imperial Defence at No. 2, Whitehall Gardens, where there will be sittings on three days. Those sittings will be confined to the actual members of the Conference who sit at this table. Mr. FISHER : I was going to ask a question on that point. My two colleagues are directly interested in the matter of defence. Mr. HARCOURT : All those who are here. The PRESIDENT : All the Ministers at the table. Adjourned to Thursday next at 11 o'clock.

13—A. 4.