Mr. Morrison and "Beveridge"
Many people, reading Mr. Herbert Morrison's speech at Bolton last Friday, may have felt that he was damning the Beveridge Report with faint praise. The fact that the adoption of a policy to avoid unemployment is of even greater importance affords no reason for making light 9f provision for social security. Realising that he may have laid himself open to criticism, he attempted on Sunday to correct the impression, and suggested that he was merely indi- cating that the Report was not perfect or acceptable in every par- ticular and in fact that he was emphasising the Assumption " C " of Sir William Beveridge himself. On that point Sir William had a word to say last Tuesday. The conditions of security and happiness enumerated by him were three, and the Plan for Social Security dealt with one. But "it is vital that we should get them all." The scheme which he had advanced was put forward as a minimum, not a maximum. What is disturbing about Mr. Morrison's speeches is that he seems perfectly satisfied with the course of events. He does not seem in the least disturbed that a year has passed since the country was profoundly stirred by the publication of the Beveridge scheme and the expectation of quick action. He thinks it quite enough that at some time during the next few months we may look for- ward to a White Paper stating the Government's intention, and even then he is able to hold out no more than a "reasoned hope" that the scheme will be one "owing much to the inspiration of the Beveridge Report and calculated to comfort the country." The vast majority of the country, unlike the Government, made up its mind about the Beveridge Report long -ago, and will be not in the least comforted if some attenuated spectre of it is offered in its place.
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