HAURAKI SEAT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 December 1941, Page 3

HAURAKI SEAT

1 —'♦ LABOUR PARTY ATTITUDE WILL NOT BE CONTESTED. STATEMENT BY MR FRASER. (Bv Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. The Labour Party will not, contest the Hauraki electorate rendered, vacant by the death of Lieutenant-Col-onel J. M. Allen in the Libyan campaign. The Prime Minister, Mr Fraser, announced last night that both the ' Hauraki Labour Representation Committee and the National Executive of the party had decided that the seat would not be contested by a Labour candidate. i Mr Fraser said that in addition to the fact that any by-election contest was most objectionable at the present moment with the Japanese threat hanging immediately over us, and while our Commonwealth and our allies, the United States, were being attacked so ruthlessly in the Pacific, the thought of contesting a seat rendered vacant by the death of an Opposition soldier Member of Parliament, who lost his life bravely fighting for all of us on the field of battle, was simply unthinkable. “Apart from the evil effect of spreading strife and discord when national unity is imperative as never before, which is more than an adequate reason for abstaining from a contest,” said the Prime Minister. “I feel with the Government and the Government Party that the refraining from an election contest is a tribute of respect to a gallant' soldier Member of Parliament, who has laid down his life for all the people of the constituency, and indeed, of the country as a whole, irrespective of political association. I feel sure that this altitude accurately reflects the almost unanimous opinion of the people of New Zealand.”