In July 1940, following the shock of the fall of France, New Zealand Prime Minister Peter Fraser set up a war cabinet, including two members of the opposition National Party (Gordon Coates and Adam Hamilton). John Cecil Hill's cartoon, entitled 'Believe it or not', suggests the awkwardness of the arrangement. The war cabinet took responsibility for the conduct of the war while domestic issues were left to the wider cabinet. The opposition members of the war cabinet did not have official portfolios. The others pictured here, besides Fraser, Coates and Hamilton, are Walter Nash and Frederick Jones.
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Alexander Turnbull Library
Reference:
A-314-3-006
Cartoon by John Cecil Hill
Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.
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