THE PRACTICE OF DIPLOMACY
measure of our own neglect. A vigilant public opinion is the best guarantee of efficiency in any public service.
Public opinion is now as wide awake as we can ever hope it will be, and the Foreign Office is taking its own steps. It has already greatly strengthened its personnel by a timely reinforcement of the Political Intelligence Department, and Lord Robert Cecil's speech (3ist July 1918) gave promise of still wider reforms. The substance of these reforms consists in: (a) throwing open the gates of diplomacy to competent candidates irrespective of wealth or social position; (b) paying a genuine living wage to all diplomatists from the date of their entry into service; (c) providing more appropriate tests of merit on entry and for promotion; (d) organising the service in such a manner as to set the junior diplomatist free for political work; (e) setting up a system of promotion and retiral which will give young ability a reasonable hope of occupying responsible posts before dotage or despair overtakes it; (f) establishing a strong Appointment-Committee at the Foreign Office, which will send the right man to the right place and destroy favouritism. These six reforms are indispensable
