Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Germany – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 14 December 1949.
Professor Douglas Savory
, Queen's University of Belfast
12:00,
14 December 1949
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs why no reply has been sent to the petition of the Aldermen of Heligoland, handed into the British High Commission of Control in Berlin on 10th June, 1947; and whether arrangements can now be made for the return to their island, after eight years of enforced exile, of the Frisian natives, who were British subjects up to 9th August, 1890, and who are now suffering distress on the Continent of Europe.
Secretary of State was originally the title given to the two officials who conducted the Royal Correspondence under Elizabeth I. Now it is the title held by some of the more important Government Ministers, for example the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.
