The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1940. AUSTRALIA'S VERDICT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 226, 23 September 1940, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun.

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1940. AUSTRALIA'S VERDICT.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the torong that reeds resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

The machinery of democracy has functioned in Australia. Hundreds of candidates have expounded their merits and proclaimed their superior fitness to take seats in the House of Representatives. Millions of men and women, having pondered, or perhaps, without having pondered, the importance of the issues placed before them in thousands of speeches, have gone to the election booths and voted. The result, judged from interim returns, is that the political situation is substantially unchanged. The United Australia-Country coalition has not been displaced, but it has not received that unmistakable endorsement and mandate which it sought. The Labour parties may have gained slightly, but they are still short of a majority, even if they hang together. They may have difficulty in hanging together, for Mr. Beaslcy's group of five were described by Mr. Curtin during the campaign as "scabs." And Mr. Curtin, himself, campaigning energetically in the East, had to neglect his own constituency in the West, and in consequence appears to have losfc it. Besides declining to give any one party a decisive majority, which none had before, the electors seem to have rejected the opportunity offered them in several constituencies to infuse "new blood" into the House of Representatives. The chief gain is to be seen in the election of Dr. Evatt, whose ability and unique experience will be of value whether he is in the Government or out of it.

The result of the election is one from which no one can derive much satisfaction. In wartime, more than at any other time, a Government needs strength. Its leaders, if they are to direct the nation's war effort with the utmost vigour and determination, need freedom from the worry and vexation associated with an inadequate majority in the Parliament and in the country. If there were one Government party in Australia, the majority which Mr. Menzies (assuming that he retains his leadership) seems likely to command might be sufficient, but the coalition has never been happy, and its Country party members from time to time seem to ignore the principle of Cabinet responsibility. It remains to be seen 'if the new House, fresh from facing the electors' somewhat enigmatic countenance, will be more inclined than the old to favour the proposal to set up a national Government. One factor in Labour's past refusal to join in such a Government was undoubtedly its hope of gaining power at the elections. Now that that hope has been disappointed, the chance of sharing in the administration may be more attractive. As both Government and Opposition favour a vigorous war policy, it should not be impossible to find a basis for collaboration.