ACTION IN AUSTRALIA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 December 1941, Page 5

ACTION IN AUSTRALIA

MEETING THE EXTENDED WAR CALL COMPLETE STRATEGIC REVISION. STATEMENT BY FEDERAL PREMIER. jfeCßy Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) Hl MELBOURNE, December 8. q The Prime Minister, Ml' Curtin, has ordered the immediate taking of every measure to place Australia on a war footing. Mr Curtin said after a meeting of the War Cabinet tonight that Parliament was being called together for next Tuesday. The War Cabinet would meet again tomorrow. Additional appreciation of the situation was now called for, the Government taking the view that the Pacific war was not an incident in a general war, but was itself a new war. Mr Curtin added: “It makes necessary a complete revision of the whole strategy of the general war.” 'Cabinet, he said, had decided today to cancel all leave for troops, and to prohibit entirely the consumption of petrol for pleasure purposes. Work would continue throughout the holidays in all essential services. The use of public transport services would be I restricted to necessary purposes, thereL by conserving coal and petrol for inLffiistry. The Supply Department had Kjeen asked to advise the Government

what establishments should be allowed to trade after 6 p.m„ as a means of effecting a saving of lighting power. Mr E. J. Ward, Minister of Labour, is to proceed to Darwin to deal with the organisation and supply of labour at. that port. Plans for extensions of the present partial mobilisation were being considered, and new jteps were being taken by the A.R.P.