3 JANUARY 1947, Page 18

FOREIGN OFFICE REFORM

SIR,—I am grateful to Mr. Harold Nicolson for summarising so fairly my suggestions for immediate Fdreign Office reform. The article in which they were contained was written some eighteen months ago ; but nothing which has happened since has caused me to modify the analysis of which he approves or the conclusions which he condemns. Mr. Nicolson criticises my suggestion for replacing inadequate Ambassadors and heads of departments by outsiders or men drawn -from other Govern- ment departments, on the ground that it would mean the introduction of a "spoils system" and "amount to a breach of faith." He seems to overlook the fact that interchange between the foreign and home services has already been approved in principle, and that the appoint- ment of outsiders such as Lord Lothian had proved successful long before the war. A spoils system means political patronage and nothing in my article evenly remotely suggested approval for such an idea. I was concerned solely to ensure that men of the highest calibre would hold these responsible jobs and that such men should not be excluded from consideration simply because they had not served in the Foreign Service.

His objection that this proposal would amount to a breach of faith frankly astonishes me. Does he seriously suggest that the State has entered into an implied contract with young entrants of twenty-two that all Ambassadors should be selected from among them whether they are adequate to the task or not? I cannot believe it. Yet the suggestion which he condemns was limited to the replacement of unsatisfactory officials in the interim period before men recruited and trained under the Eden scheme could rise to the highest posts. Mr. Nicolson asserts that behind t4is suggestion is the fallacy that there is no such thing as continuity and no such pninciple as "the defence of British rights and interests." If he attributes this view to me, he is mistaken. I have constantly stressed the necessity for getting back to this -principle, so grossly violated in the ten years before the war ; of redefining what our interests are and of correlating our policy with them. A Labour Government should maintain continuity as far as possible. But 114-... Nicolson would surely agree that it would be wrong to do so if that continuity is found to conflict with British rights and interests.—Yours, House of Commons.

R. H. S. GROSSMAN.