C. P. Scott on Stanley Baldwin

“Breakfasted...with Smuts at the Savoy... I asked him what he thought of Baldwin who was something of a dark horse. Was he strong and was he able? Smuts gave a somewhat qualified judgment on both points. An excellent man he said and thoroughly well meaning and honest, but lacking, he evidently thought, in judgment and drive.”

“Lunched with Ramsay MacDonald at the Athenaeum... The Government was absolutely discredited in the country. It was the feeblest and foolishest within memory and a real discredit to the country... As to poor Baldwin I was talking to him the other day about something and he was entirely at sea... He is an extraordinary failure. He does not know what he wants to do and, if he did, he has no power to assert himself—the weakest prime minister within memory.”