MR. CHAMBERLAIN AND PUBLIC HEALTH
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
Sia,—The present campaign for a healthier and fitter Britain may seem rather belated to many of us, but it is perhaps appropriate that we should have had to wait for it until Mr. Chamberlain became Prime Minister, for Mr. Chamberlain is now only extending, on a national scale, the remarkable work which he achieved in municipal work in Birmingham years ago.
The wide range and efficiency of health and medical services in Birmingham today we owe more to the present Prime Minister than to anybody else, his father, Mr. Joseph Cham- berlain, excepted.
Yet at the same time it is well to remember how great a debt Birmingham owes to the City of Bradford, one of the outstanding pioneers in local government and still amongst the most resourceful and progressive municipalities in the country. I believe I am right in saying that Bradford was the first local authority to set up, for instance, maternity and child-welfare clinics. The present Prime Minister, when he was active in the direction of Birmingham's municipal affairs, was one of the earliest visitors to Bradford to study the experimental work of the corporation and profit by their example.
Mr. Chamberlain came to the Premiership by way of the Ministry of Health, where he first availed himself for national purposes of his practical experience in local government. That experience brings home to us today the necessity on the part of local authorities to study the work of other authorities if the country, as a whole, is to gain the full benefit of pioneering achievement,—Yours faithfully, G. B. J. ATHOE.
43 Grosvenor Place, Westminster, London, S.W. r.
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