[On 27 May 1939 the Council of the League of Nations decided to
set up a committee to report on measures to develop and expand the
League's machinery for dealing with economic and social problems
and to promote active participation by all nations in efforts to
solve these problems. The committee met in Paris between 7 and 12
August 1939 under Bruce's chairmanship and drew up a report which
recommended the establishment of a new League Central Committee
for Economic and Social Questions which would direct the work of
existing League committees on these matters. This proposal was
accepted by the Twentieth Assembly of the League on 14 December
1939 and an organising committee set up to implement it. The
following document refers to the first and only meeting of this
committee which took place at The Hague on 7 and 8 February 1940,
the Australian representative being F. L. McDougall. The meeting
achieved little and although the committee planned to continue its
work the extension of the war in Europe prevented it from doing
so. For further information see file AA: A2937, League of Nations.

Twentieth Assembly. (Bruce Report).]

I saw Butler, who had with him Assheton [1] and Roger Makins [2],
and discussed the forthcoming meeting at the Hague to consider the
Bruce report. The meeting had been contemplated with a view to the
British Delegates being instructed, but when I spoke to Butler a
few days ago about the question of the meeting he suggested it
might be a good thing if I would attend their own British
discussions on the subject.

At the meeting Butler asked me what my views of the position were
and I told him that I attached the greatest importance to the
forthcoming meeting and I was clear that we should go ahead with
the appointment of the other countries to the Central Committee
and the appointment of some of the specialist members. I also said
that I felt it was desirable that a date should be decided upon
for the meeting of the Central Committee, but that I was strongly
opposed to the consideration at this meeting of the Executive of
the programme of work that should be considered when the Central
Committee met. I went at some length into the reasons for this
view which embraced the necessity for an organisation of this
character being available to consider the questions that would
arise after the war in reconstituting the whole economic,
financial and soda] system, and also the problems that would have
to be faced following upon demobilisation both of men and of
industry. I outlined to them my hopes that in the near future it
would be necessary for the Allies to declare their peace aims,
stressing that I realised the impracticability of declaring our
war aims at the present time save the broad statement as to
winning the war and preventing aggression in the future.

I pointed out that if this were done there would be implemented in
such a statement the necessity for a great deal of preliminary
work. If that position arose it might be that the Allies would
feel that the economic side of the League was the authority to
undertake the necessary investigations owing to the fact that it
would be essential that neutrals should co-operate in the
considerations of these questions and yet it would be difficult
for one of the belligerents to invoke the aid of the neutrals on
an ad hoc Committee.

I pointed out that if in fact the United Kingdom and France did
decide to use the instrument of the League it would then mean that
when the programme of work had to be considered by the Central
Committee it would have before it the views of the United Kingdom
and France as to the work which had to be carried out and it would
also mean that the Committee would start upon its career with the
full blessing of Britain and France.

We had some considerable discussion with regard to the points I
had raised and arrived at complete agreement.

The question of the relations between the International Labour
Office and the new Central Committee was raised but I suggested
that with a little good will and tact it should be possible to
overcome any difficulties which existed.

We also discussed the question of early steps to invoke the
cooperation of countries outside the League and I put forward as
my view that it would be desirable to defer doing this in a
serious way until we had seen whether during the next few weeks
real co-operation could be obtained from Britain and France.

This view also was accepted.

We then considered how far neutrals would be deterred from coming
into the new organisation by the fact that it has a certain link
with the political side of the League through the necessity of the
Budget being examined by the Supervisory Committee and passed by
the Assembly.

We came to the conclusion this was not very formidable an
objection as the difficulty had been got over in the case of the
International Labour Office in which the United States of America
was playing its part notwithstanding the link on the financial
side between the Labour Office and the Political League.