403

LETTER DOWNER TO BUNTING

Australian High Commission, London, 1 September 1972

Personal

I am delighted by the Prime Minister’s letter to Nigel Bowen concerning the proposed new arrangements for the control of this Mission.1 I thought his letter was excellent—but having read it, I could not help but I think why is it necessary to make any alteration at all, when so much is going to remain the same? I do not depart from the views on this subject which I have expressed all along to various Prime Ministers that it seems unnecessary to change a system which has always worked smoothly, efficiently, and certainly to the personal advantage of whoever happens to be Prime Minister. With all the problems confronting Governments in Australia both now and in the coming years, it seems unwise to provoke new administrative matters merely, I suspect, to satisfy the ambitions of our Foreign Affairs Department.

1 Document 395.

[NAA: Al209, 1971/9449 PART 2]