Lord Olivier’s statement
To us in this country, the only important thing in the debate which took place in the House of Lords on Monday with regard to the Indian situation is the speech of the Secretary of State. That speech was unhappily neither very strong nor very definite in regard to certain vital issues, but it was the only contribution to the debate that had any real value. It dealt with four outstanding and concrete problems and in regard to each of them it has something to say which might or might not be satisfactory to those vitally affected by it, but which, at any rate, was worthy of serious notice. The first of these questions was the Lee Commission’s report. The two speakers who had preceded Lord Olivier in the debate, Lord Peel himself as well as Lord Lee, had both not only urged the claims of the Services to consideration, but the necessity and desirability of taking immediate action on the report. Lord Olivier defended with warmth the statement already made by the Government of India with his full concurrence, namely, that no decision with regard to the Commission’s recommendations would be taken till after a discussion in the Assembly in September. The Commission itself, he said, had expressed the opinion that its report should be treated as a whole. That view had been accepted by himself, his Council and the Government of India, and it was just because they had accepted it that they had been unable to take immediate action. The reason is quite clear. It was thus put by himself: “Nobody knowing the magnitude of the issues involved could expect that a Secretary of State who took the report at all seriously could possibly be in a position to pass final orders on it as a whole within two or three months.”
