Britain, the Commonwealth and Europe: an Overview

Abstract

When touring Australia in 1884, Lord Rosebery, who was later to become British Foreign Secretary, made a speech in Adelaide in which he referred to ‘the British Commonwealth of Nations’.1 This is believed to be the first use in public of the term ‘Commonwealth’ in the context of a grouping of nations. It was not until 1926 that this concept was more precisely defined. Lord Balfour, a former Prime Minister, who had returned to office in 1922 as Foreign Secretary, described Britain and the Dominions as ‘autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status and in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations’.2 Five years later — in 1931 — this relationship was enshrined in the Statute of Westminster — an Act of the British Parliament which conferred on the Dominions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Newfoundland and the Irish Free State the power to repeal or amend acts of the British Parliament which applied to them. It was this Act of Parliament which created what came to be known as Dominion Status.