SIR,—After reading Your M.P. I cannot quite agree that it
is waste-paper. It may be one-sided and prejudiced, but its statements are true and substantiated. Mr. Hogg and his friends are at perfect liberty to compose—if they can—a book full of equally foolish or mischievous speeches by Labour and Liberal M.P.s. This book has told at least one reader many things he did not know before. For instance: that the present Premier voted against a Ministry of Supply in 1936, against an increase of old-age pensions in 1939, and against the proposal to remove Mr. Chamberlain in 1940. Fortunately for all of us, Mr. Churchill's vote in this last case was of no effect.
I did not know, either, that members of the Anglo-German Fellowship were on Mr. Chamberlain's committee to inquire into delays in armament after Munich. The average Englishman's memory is so short that it is a good thing for him to " brush up his politicians " from time to time. As Gracchus says in his preface, " the Tory may have changed his opinions —but that does not alter the essence of his character."
The only quotation from Mr. Quintin Hogg rather supports the views of Gracchus: " the local Tory associations are rotten to the core." Has Mr. Hogg changed his opinion since 1934? By the way, why does Mr. Hogg conclude that an agrarian reformer--e.g., Mr. Hudson?—is neces- sarily bilious?
As for anonymity, he should train his guns on Sir Walter Scott, the Brontë sisters, and the leader-writers of The Times and The Spectator.—
Yours faithfully,
Previous page
