My dear Prime Minister,

Since last mail the Easter holidays have intervened, and there is
therefore little to report to you.

I am enclosing a copy of an interesting letter which I received
from Sir Francis Floud [1] about the position of British wine, and
I am to-day sending you a short cable summarising this information
[2], as I think you may find it useful in dealing with the Federal
Viticultural Council.

During the Easter days I was the guest of the Orient Company in a
trial trip of the S.S. 'Orford'. We went to Antwerp for twenty-
four hours, and then cruised down the Channel, returning to
Southampton. The boat is remarkably fine, and the Orient Company
did their guests extremely well. There were about 250 people on
board, including a number of men with whom it was extremely useful
to make contacts. Labour was rather heavily represented with about
five M.P.'s including Mr. Clynes [3] and four Trade Union leaders,
including Ernest Bevin [4] and C. T. Cramp. [5] I had long talks
with both Bevin and Cramp, and made suggestions to them in regard
to the agenda for the (Commonwealth) Empire Trade Union Conference
that is to take place in London this year.

They told me how difficult it was to get any useful discussion on
migration, owing to the opposition to the migration idea which was
expressed by the Labour representatives from Overseas. I put it to
them that instead of tabling resolutions for discussion about
migration, they might achieve much better results if the British
Delegation put on the Agenda subjects which would lead to
discussion of Empire development rather than of migration. I shall
do what I can to follow up these talks.

The man who was actually responsible for the agenda is Arthur
Henderson [6], who is not a very pleasant person, but I expect
through Tom Johnston [7] and Margaret Bondfield [8] I can get this
point of view considered.

I hope that during Easter you have had a good rest after the very
strenuous work of combining administration and a Parliamentary
Session. Having regard to the amount of really first-class
assistance which you are able to command, I doubt whether there is
any more strenuous job in the world than that of being Prime
Minister of the Commonwealth.

Yours sincerely,
F. L. MCDOUGALL