PACIFIC EVENTS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 29 January 1942, Page 3

PACIFIC EVENTS

HOUSE OF COMMONS DEBATE CONTINUED WAR EFFORT CRITICISED. MANY ASPECTS RAISED. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) LONDON, January 28. In the House of Commons debate Mr F. W. Pethick Lawrence (Labour), the Leader of the Opposition, said that Mi Churchill’s confidence motion was founded on his knowledge of people s anxiety founded on ignorance which must be dispelled if weakness in the war effort was not going to persist. A smoke-screen had been put over the Pacific events deliberately to hide them from the public. Apart from the inability to send immense armaments, to the Far East there were grave mistakes made locally. The public were uneasy, seeing something like a wedge driven between the British people and the Australian people. The Government must make clear beyond doubt that this breach would be healed in the early future. Sir Herbert Williams (Conservative) said that the fact that Mr Churchill had proposed a vote of confidence was a measure of the fact that he knew that he had lost confidence. A ( vote of confidence would give no satisfaction to the House and uneasiness and criticism would continue. The Prime Minister.should not be Minister of Defence. He dominated the Chief-of-Staff, who took orders from him. “We have 4,000,000 or 5,000,000 men under arms here,” he said. “Was it impossible adequately to equip 60,000 in Malaya? If Mr Churchill is satisfied with his team he is the only person in the country who is satisfied.” Mr J. Henderson Stewart (Lib. Nat.) said that Mr Churchill’s position was unchallenged, but that there was not the same degree of confidence in the Government as a whole, or its record in the last six months. Uneasiness and criticism abound in all parts of the country,” he said. “The shortcomings of our production effort for two years remain’ a failure of the first magnitude. Our production is not within measureable distance of what it might be.” The debate was adjourned.