2 NOVEMBER 1934, Page 6

I suppose Sir John Simon hardly intended to pay the

Prime Minister a back-handed compliment at Monday's National Labour luncheon, but when he congratulated Mr. MacDonald on the way in which the Cabinet had stood the test of the withdrawal of his leadership for three months some at least of the less obtuse of his hearers must have been conscious of a possible double entendre. It undoubtedly did stand it conspicuously well. But there may have been more than one reason for that.

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