POLITICAL DISCORD

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 April 1943, Page 2

POLITICAL DISCORD

ACUTE IN AUSTRALIA GOVERNMENT GIVES WAY TO SENATE. ON SOLDIER PREFERENCE ISSUE. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) CANBERRA, April 2. The Government has accepted, in the form insisted on by the Senate, an amendment to the Repatriation Bill, providing for preference to returned service men in the employment of the Commonwealth after the war. .By doing this, the Government has capitulated for the third time in the last three weeks to the Senate Opposition. After the amended Bill had been passed, Parliament adjourned till June. In the last three weeks, the Opposition in the Senate, holding a majority of 19 to 17, has forced the Government to drop its proposal to retain income taxation refunds, has cancelled the clause linking the Social Welfare Bill with the Income Tax Rates Bill, and now has insisted on the clause giving preference only to soldiers in the Repatriation Bill. The Government had agreed to a compromise with the •Senate on its preference clause by suggesting that preference should be extended to include merchant seamen and civil aviation pilots who served in combat zones. But the Senate, declaring that preference for civilians had no place in the Repatriation Bill, rejected the Government’s suggestion. At a meeting of the Labour Party caucus to consider the Senate rejection, the Prime Minister, Mr Curtin, is reported to have told members that he and other Ministers were mentally and physically exhausted and in no state to continue fighting with the Senate. Pointing out that soldier pensioners would be deprived of nearly £200,000 in increased pensions for every month the Bill was held up, he suggested that the best course was to accept the Senate’s demand and to introduce a comprehensive Preference Bill later. This course was agreed to. “The preference issue has ended in the defeat of the Government and its retreat into recess,” comments the “Sydney Morning Herald” editorially. “Licking their (wounds, Ministers may reflect that they will be at least acquitted of the charge of pursuing party warfare to the point at, which either the genuine interests of ex-service men would have had to be sacrified by the withdrawal of the Repartriation Bill, or a repmature dissolution of the House of Representatives brought about. “Political circumspection is not one of the qualities for which Senator McLeay and his friends of the Senate Opposition are renowned. They insisted on humiliating as well as defeating the Ministry, ignoring the fact that petty . triumphs of this kind in war time may be purchased at too high a cost to the reputation of the Opposition. Unless the Senate majority abates its preferences for party politics at all costs, it - will bring grave damage on the Opposition cause.”