180 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL CANADIAN INSTITUTE.  [VOL. XI 
APPENDIX | 'V: 
MEMORANDUM ON THE SUGGESTIONS MADE BY THE GOVERNMENTS 
OF VICTORIA AND NEW SOUTH WALES FOR MAKING THE 
SCHEME FOR THE ORGANISATION AND DEVEL- 
OPMENT OF SCIENTIFIC ‘AND _IN- 
DUSTRIAL RESEARCH APPLICABLE 
TO THE WHOLE EMPIRE. 
1. The Committee of the Privy Council for Scientific and Industrial Research have 
considered the papers communicated to them by the Secretary of State for the Colonies 
on the 23rd November 1915 and the 3rd January 1916, including memoranda by the 
Minister of Public Works of Victoria, and by the Honourable Premier for New South 
Wales. It is suggested in these memoranda that the scheme described in the White 
Paper issued by Mr. Arthur Henderson on the 23rd July 1915 [Cd. 8005], and sub- 
sequently embodied in the order in Council of the 28th July 1915 (which is reprinted 
as an appendix to this memorandum), should be extended and made applicable to the 
Overseas Dominions, or even to the Empire as a whole. 
2. In the memorandum by the Minister of Public Works of Victoria, special stress 
is laid on the statement made in paragraph 3 of the White Paper that— 
“it is clearly desirable that the scheme should operate over the Kingdom as a 
whole with as little regard as possible to the Tweed and the Irish Channel. The 
research done should be for the Kingdom was a whole, and there should be 
complete liberty to utilise the most effective institutions and investigators as 
available, irrespective of their location in England, Wales, Scotland, or Ireland.” 
The Committee of the Council have no hesitation in expressing their concurrence 
in the view that the principle of the passage above cited is capable of a much wider 
application, and so far as in them lies, they are prepared to co-operate cordially with the 
Secretary of State in promoting such an arrangement between the Mother Country and 
the Overseas Dominions as would secure the effective application of the principle 
throughout the Empire. A complete and effective system of research implies the 
power to carry out each piece of work in the place where the conditions are most favour- 
able and where it can be performed most thoroughly, quickly, and economically. It is 
obvious that a reciprocal arrangement by which the scientific and industrial resources 
of the Mother Country in men, material, and equipment could be made available for a 
research in which any of the Dominions was primarily interested, and which conversely 
would place the resources of the Overseas Dominions at the disposal of the Mother 
Country and of each other, would greatly augment the aggregate research capacity 
of the Empire and enhance the productivity of its industries. 
3. The simplest form of Imperial co-operation would be an arrangement by which 
one Government (or some administrative body acting under its authority) would act 
as the agent of another Goverment for the purpose of arranging, carrying out, and 
supervising a specific research, the entire cost being borne by the Government initiating 
the research. It is not outside the existing powers of the Committee of the Privy 
Council to aid a research intended to benefit a British industry, even though the research 
may be conducted beyond the borders of the United Kingdom. For instance, the best 
means of recovering a metal found in one of the Overseas Dominions and needed for the 
production of some new alloy required by the British Metallurgical or Engineering 
Industry, might form the subject of a research conducted in that Dominion at the 
instance and at the cost of the Committee of Council. For this purpose their Advisory 
