SWEEPING SUCCESS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 August 1943, Page 3

SWEEPING SUCCESS

LABOUR IN THE FEDERAL ELECTIONS BIG MARGIN OF STRENGTH IN HOUSE. MAJORITY PROBABLE ALSO IN SENATE. SYDNEY, August 22. Labour swept the polls at the Federal elections on Saturday, and will face the new Parliament with a substantial majority in the House. 11 also has excellent prospects of gaining a. majority in the Senate, thus ending Ihe position of the last Parliament, where it had a majority in the J louse, but a minority in the Senate. When the ocunting of votes ended last night there was every indication that Labour will gain 15 or 16 seats, which will give it 50 or 51 seats in the new House. The result exceeds Labour’s own most optimistic expectations. Independents and the plethora of new parties made a lamentable showing, and any votes they received were at the expense of the Opposition. Labour is leading on the Senate counting in all States. The new Senate may give the Government a 22-14 majority, which is the first Labour Senate majority for more than 20 years. CURTIN’S SMASHING VICTORY. Mr Curtin had a smashing victory in Fremantle, polling more than 27,000 votes, his two opponents between them gathering only 14,000. Dr. Evatt polled 35,000 against two opposition candidates’ total of 13,000. Other Cabinet members also had substantial majorities. The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Fadden, at the moment is in a slight minority, but further returns and preferences will probably hold the seat for him. Mr Menzies also had a comfortable win at Kooyong. Labour so far has gained nine seats from the United Australia Party, six from the Country Party, and possibly one from Independent Labour. PREMIER’S PRESTIGE REGARDED AS EXPLAINING LANDSLIDE. “TREMENDOUS PERSONAL TRIUMPH." (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, August 22. “Labour's majority comes entirely from the prestige and popularity of Mr Curtin himself,” declares the Sydney “Sunday Telegraph” commenting editorially on the certain landslide result of tlie Australian Federal elections. The Curtin Government, will go back to office with a probably majority of 28 — a record Labour margin and the biggest enjoyed by any Australian Government since 1931. “With slightly more than half the votes counted today, Labour had polled 1,250,000, the combined United Australia and County parties 705,000, and others about 600,000. The likely state of the parties in the new House of Representatives is: Labour, 50; United Australia and Country Parties, 22; Independents, 2. In the old House the parties were: Labour, 35; United Australia and Country Parties, 36; Independents, 3. “A working Labour majority would have been a tribute to Mr Curtin. The sweeping result of the election is a tremendous personal triumph. Labour appears to have gained substantial votes in. almost every electorate. Majorities in safe Labour seats are fat; in safe Opposition seats the majorities arc much leaner.

“Significant of Mr Curtin’s all-power-ful influence are: First, the expected defeat of the sitting Independent Labour member for Bourke, Victoria, Mr M. Blackburn, who opposed the Prime Minister on the Bill to extend the area of service of the Australian militia; secondly, the probable defeat in Reid, New South Wales, of Mr Lang, Independent Labour, the former State Premier. Both these recalcitrant Labour men will probably lose to official party candidates.” Some official Labour candidates whom it was expected would be defeated, including the much-criticised Minister of War Organisation, Mr Dedman, have simply romped home. Preferences are expected to retain the Henty seat lor the Victorian, Independent, and chairman of the Commonwealth Rationing Commission, Mr Coles, against the strong bid of a brilliant young United Australia Party candidate, Captain Gullett, M.C., whose father, the late Sir Henry Gullett, held the seat for many years. The support of Mr Coles and his re-elected fellow Victorian Independent, Mr Wilson, kept the Curtin Government in office. Captain Gullett polled best of all the service men candidates who were not sitting members. NEW FACTIONS FAIL. The Australian voters flatly rejected the “khaki election,” and voted mainly for straight party tickets. Women candidates also fared badly, though two may possibly be returned. These are Mrs Jessie Street, Labour, wife of a Supreme Court judge, and Dame Enid

Lyons, United Australia Party, widow of a late Australian Prime Minister. Though more than half of the contesting candidates were independents, they failed completely. Twenty-five factions were represented at the polls, and all except the old established parties made miserable showings. Communists polled only 46,000 of 2,280,000 votes counted today. The One Parliament for Australia and the Liberal Democrats did best of the new parties with 42,000 and 28,000 progress votes respectively. As expected, the swing to Labour was most marked in war-industrialised South Australia. But Queensland, where Labour losses were widely predicted because of war hardships, also saw a heavy increase in the Labour vote. Several changes are expected in the new Labour Ministry. It is considered unlikely that the suspended Minister for Labour, Mr Ward, whose Sydney re-election majority may be a record, will be reappointed to his old portfolio. About 800,000 service men’s votes, still to be counted, can make no difference to the result. “Mr Curtin may find this overwhelming victory an embarrassment,” says the “Daily Telegraph.” “There are elements in his party not so capable as he of keeping their heads in an hour of triumph. They will want to interpret this great vote as an invitation to a revolutionary change in the Australian way of life. It is no such thing. The whole result devolved around Mr Curtin’s own prestige and popularity. How Australia should reorganise itself for the future was an issue never mentioned.” POLLING INCIDENTS ENEMY RECONNAISSANCE PLANE DRIVEN OFF. (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, August 21. Men of an Australian anti-aircraft battery at a northern station, who were in the middle of recording their votes for today’s Federal election, had to drop everything to man their guns and drive off a Japanese reconnaissance plane. The incident was one of many, humorous and serious, encountered by armyofficers acting as returning officers in operational areas. Senior officers have used conveyances from aircraft to jeeps, camels and canoes to secure the votes of the troops spread over tens of thousands of miles of country, much of it so remote that there has never been a ballot box within 300 miles before. So efficient has been the army ballot organisation that most of the soldiers recorded their votes well before the polling day.