With his huge height, ils formidable red hair and. his. faculty for "language that would have been deemed intemperate on Board a pirate ship," "13.13" more politely, Mr. Brendon Bracken, has certainly brighten ed up things at the Ministry of Information. We actually had earlier and fuller details of the meeting of President Roosevelt and, Ins. Churchill than were given out in New York. The stereotyped communiques -of the Ait Ministry "C'they marched 40° parasangs and had breakfast" sort of thing) are supple~ mented with stories which convey something fo the minds, Last week, for instance, we were told that over 300 aeroplanes had been used in an attack on Germany two nights before, though. we were warned. that, such delirious disclosures must not be regarded as the yule, Incidentally Mr. Brendon Bracken has fut out a lot of deadwood from the MO. This makes his own personality more conspicuous when the Red Tabs are looking for Dlood. How long will they stand his dynamic demands for publicity There is no doubt that we are hitting the Germans very hard. Pictures of the recent raid-on the huge inapsack power, station show how low our bombers must have descended, their height being easily judged by the relative position of the wing and tail of an aeroplane at the edge of the picture and the power station chimneys, Another, ture taken from" directly' overhead. shows eight huge fires burning in the station. Our osses are necessarily higher. In July we Jost 76 to n certain 49 Germans. This is the first month in which we have lost more ma~ chines than the enemy. But apart from the fact that he probably lost more than our strict accounting, allows us to claim, our per~ centage of 1oss—only about four when we sent out those 300 mentioned above—is, not high and is far better than the percentage of losses of the Germans in their bist day: ight attacks on this country. An amusing feature of the recent air war was the feverish haste with which the Nazis announced a few days "ago that British planes had attacked Berlin, when in fact none of our planes were near Berlin and the raid had been done Russian planes, But as Dr. Goebbels had a ready destroyed the entire Russian Air Force, it was impossible for him to admit that it was still able to attack Berlin. for assault and battery. But one can almost hear the shrieks of the good Socialists at Bevin's heresy. On the question of wages the Transport and General Workers were so little impressed by what Mr. Bevin said that they 40 pass a resolution rather obscurely worded, but quite plainly indicating that they meant to ask for more Wages in view of the increased cost of living. The latter argument, by the way, is wearing thin. "During" the past six or seven months the upward movement of prices generally has not been above two per cent. What the unions cannot or will not Tealize is" that higher wages instantly send prices up, and that there is always a long time lag before the wages catch up. "When they do; up the prices again. The ideal solution would have been (a) to conscript all labour as men fare conscripted for the Services, and (b) to fix the prices of all necessaries of life. But the ideal is not always the practicable, certain ly not under such a Government as that with Which we began the war. whose notion of a Practical ideal was to buy off Hitler at other Tt has been stated in one or two papers. that some of the miners who were taken into the Army are to be sent back te the pits. The voluntary return of those who went into. other employment when coaling languished after the collapse of France has been disap-
resent anthracite is plentiful: that is con-_ pointing. and the situation Is serious. At jut foling for those of us who have. kiteh~ stoves and a good hot water system, for with plenty. of hot water you can endure a lot of other shortages, But soft coal is the crux. We have nothing like the reserves which the Government promised to accumulate during the summer and the weekly output is considerably below what it should be "so what will be the end of it, God knows." Part of the trouble is that the miners do not get enough to eat for the heavy work they have fo do. Those who have read that beautiful book "How Green Was My Valle who haven't please do so without delay; you will thank me for that) will remember' how exceedingly well the miners described in it lived in the way of food. I doubt whether the chickens, hams and pies which were plentiful in the Morgan family were equally copious in later years. But certainly the miner before the war ate hugely because his work needed it. In a recent letter to the "pimes" Lord Londonderry pointed out that miners cannot cut coal in the old style on their present rationing and that absenteeism is largely due to the absolute need the men Have of day's rest. What is needed in the mine fields fs) large communal centres, provisions ed on Army lines.
With the ever-increasing' demand for men] Man; people in the Far East will remem-oth for the Services and factories, a raid her Soh Chartered Meldrum. of the 4s to be made on the Civil Service, which Bank, which he served in China and else-has hitherto been largely if not wholly ex- where for 24 years before becoming sub-empt, In the usual muddle-headed way in manager in London. He died ear! which it seems necessary for us to begin any' week quite accidentally. I understand that war, some of the best men in the Civil Ser-lhe was standing on a chair in his flat, where vies! ware called up or, allowed to join lived alone, to ix a radio wire or some-! against a wal at the beginning. Their loss has been severe thing when he fell and apparently struck Jy felt, efforts are being made to get them his head. Had there been anyone in the back and (as with the miners) an official re-he might have been saved. As it was port on the subject says that "we are satis was found dead when his servant came fled that the measures needed to secure the 'm the morning. Mr, Meldrum was only 50. return of such men in proper cases are un= He was much liked, especially by financial duly slow and uncertain. "They would -be.
Journalists, to whom within the due limits Meanwhile the age of reservation is to be of a banker's caution, he was always most raised from 30 to 35, more women and older helpful and he is much regretted by many men are to be employed and 8,000 men will friends. thus be available for war service. "About the women whom it is proposed to employ, one feels a certain doubt: the call for them al~
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.