Biographies and memoirs of Britain's top civil servants in this century, other than
where they have also been ambassadors or colonial governors, have generally been less
frequent than studies of politicians. Low of profile, high in discretion, the role of
kingmaker rather than king, maybe just the dullness of routine administration, all play their part in the explanation. The public face of Sir Humphrey Appleby in "Yes Prime
Minister" is the exception rather than the rule in Whitehall.
This is a biographical study of Sir Warren Fisher, one of the most powerful civil
servants Whitehall has known in this century. The first holder of the post of head of the
civil service in Britain and a major adviser on policy to every inter-war government
from that of Lloyd George to Neville Chamberlain, Fisher made the most of the
opportunity to exercise power and make his influence felt in foreign affairs and
defence as well as in home affairs and civil service matters. For readers of this
magazine, Fisher's special importance lies in his role as architect of what Sir Charles
Jeffries once described as "the Magna Carta of the modern Colonial Service". This
was the report on the system of appointments to the Colonial Service, presented in
1930. Technically known as Cmd.3554, in the event it was the watershed between the
earlier days of recruitment through the patronage of the Private Secretary's office and
a professional system of appointment by references and interviews. Henceforward the
Civil Service Commissioners were to be involved in the nomination of members of the
new Colonial Service Appointments Board.
Sir Ralph Furse, who was of course at the very centre of the Warren Fisher inquiry,
devoted a whole chapter to it in his autobiography (1962). Furse does not feature in
O'Halpin's index (though he appears all right in the relevant footnotes at pp.171-2),
and the whole inquiry is allowed only ten lines by O'Halpin. Indeed, he does not seem
to have consulted the Furse papers nor made much use of his Aucuparius: Recollections of a Recruiting Officer. But he does
quote Furse's own guidelines: "Convince Warren and your battle is won". Furse did:
and it was so. O'Halpin is better on Fisher's handling of the amalgamation of the
Dominions and Colonial Offices in 1926. For once, Fiziar backed the wrong horse, in
favouring Sir Hugh Clifford over Sir Samuel Wilson as the new head of the Colonial
Office - probably the right choice, given Leo Amery's comment in his diary about
Clifford being "too much of a bull in a china shop" as well as being "in a state of nerves
from overwork". Fisher was more successful, though hardly less controversial, when it
came to extending his empire over the Foreign Office by appointing his 'own' men. The
story of the "Francs affair" and alleged corruption in the FO, in which Fisher was
believed to be out for blood (rightly, and he got it) is well narrated, though once again
it can be read in greater detail in Permission to Resign by Ann Bridge, pseudonym of
the wife of Owen O'Malley, one of the diplomats at the centre of the scandal.
I have liked more on the 1930 Committee and on
the 1926 CO/DO reorganisation must not stand in the way of the wider recognition of
a first-class study of a first-class, if complex and controversial, civil servant - "fearless
... a volatile personality ... colourful but neglected ... quite exceptional ... a
difficult colleague and an impossible subordinate", as Dr. O'Halpin presents him. It
makes a first-class read, too.
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