THE BRITISH ELECTIONS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9684, 7 January 1910, Page 4

THE BRITISH ELECTIONS.

The British elections will begin to yield results on January 14th. On that date unopposed returns will come in. Birough and county elections will follow, and by the end' of the month the constitutional battle will be decided. The last general election took place in January, 1906, and the Liberals were then returned with a triumphant majority. The pledged Liberals numbered 376, while the Conservatives only totalled 130. Liberal Unionists made a party of 27, but though they went with tjie Conservatives, Labourites and Nationalist went mostly with the Liberals. The Conservatives appear, however, notwithstanding that recent appeal to the ballot boxes, to be putting up a gallant and sanguine fight. Liberals and Conservatives will no doubt view with some apprehension the prospects o£ an increase in the membership of the Labourite and Nationalist sections. At the 1900 election Labour won only nine seats; at the 1906 election it won 54. If Labour make a further spring it and the Nationalists, who numbered! 83 in the last Parliament, would be able to constitute themselves an influential third party. The closer the Conservatives run the Liberals in number of seats, the stronger for Parliamentary strategic purposes that third party becomes.