Council was set up and the work carried on under the supposed direction
of "my Lords." It was a mere fiction. There has been no clear and
consistent scheme for distributing the work of Government between the
various departments on any intelligible principles.

All are spending money, some of them enormous sums. Staffs are growing
inordinately, much of the work is duplicated, much consists in
communications with other departments which would be unnecessary if the
work of each were better defined.

It should be clear in each department who has authority to decide any
particular question, to incur expenditure, to enter into binding
agreements. The executive government of the country is in a chaotic
state, relieved to some extent by the good sense and good feeling of the
members of the great army of officials who carry it on. No one can deny
that the Civil Service is not only pure, but, taken as a whole, its
members individually are both able and industrious. It is better
organisation that is required. Some of the new Ministries ought to be
scrapped directly the War is over, and the business of others continued
only so far as necessary for winding up. But these new departments will
die hard.

Since the War new departments have grown up like mushrooms, sometimes
without any clear statement of their functions or powers being made, and
there has not been time to settle them at leisure by a course of
practice. The result is overlapping, friction which would be intolerable
but for the good-natured forbearance which English people have for a
state of confusion, waste of time and money in sending minutes, and in
correspondence between different departments, and often delays which
have had most unfortunate results. Does anyone know exactly what are the