All the debating strength of the House of Commons is outside the Government. The Labour Party possesses quite a number of good men and the. Intellectuals just dominate it, though this cleavage will be shown very prominently in time to come in the Labour Party. "Thene are, indeed, two sections—the old-fashioned Trade Unionists and the LL.P. Intellectuals. Mr. Clynes, who has led the Labour Party since 1918, represents the former, but, when the Party met last night, they promptly threw bim out by 61 votes to 56 and elected in his place Mr. Ramsay Macdonald, who is the I.L-P. Intellectual. Mr. Macdonald is, of course, by far the abler man, but at the same time, it shows, firstly, that Intellectual Labour intends to dominate the situation, and, secondly, that Labour as a whole is not particularly generous to people who have borne the burden in the heat of the day.
The Independent Labour Party is very greatly strengthened by such men as Sir John Simon and Mr. Pringle, both apostles of undiluted, vitriolic speech, while on the Government Benches themselves there are such men reposing as backbenchers as Mr. Austen Chamberlain and Sir Robert Home. Among the Free Liberals also nominally in Opposition there are Mr. Lloyd George and all his ex-Ministers. This should be sufficient indication of the strength of the criticism which the Government will have to meet.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.