FEDERAL ELECTION

Wairarapa Times-Age, 31 August 1943, Page 3

FEDERAL ELECTION

ONLY EIGHT SEATS STILL IN DOUBT SOLDIERS’ VOTE HEAVILY FOR LABOUR. TALK OF MR CURTIN GOING ABROAD. (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, August 29. Only eight of Australia’s 74 Federal electorates are now in doubt, though the final result of the Commonwealth elections will not be known till the end of the week, when the soldiers’ votes are counted and preferences allocated. Of the seats in which the outcome appears certain Labour holds 48, the Opposition 16, and Independents 2. Both of these Independents have consistently supported Labour, and are expected to continue to do so. Assessors reveal that the soldiers’ vote is going heavily in favour of Labour candidates, but the seats of the three challenged Opposition leaders, Messrs Fadden and Hughes and Sir Earle Page, now appear to be secure. In Tasmania Dame Enid Lyons, widow of the late Prime Minister, is losing ground to a Labour candidate; in Sydney Mrs Jessie Street, wife of a Supreme Court judge, is making a fight of the election for the Wentworth seat for Labour and to become the first woman to sit in the Australian House of Representatives. She holds a primary majority of 7000 over the sitting United Australia Party member Mr E. J. Harrisun, and needs about 25 per cent of preferences to win. It is being widely forecast that the Prime Minister, Mr Curtin, may visit London and Washington early in the New Year. Some American commentators, including Mr Joseph Harrison, of the “Christian Science Monitor,” have forecast that Mr Curtin would leave for abroad in October, probably addressing both the United States Congress and the British Parliament. However, the Prime Minister has a heavy legislative and administrative programme ahead, including the selection and consolidation of the new Cabinet, the Budget, and the Parliamentary session.

Official quarters feel that if Mr Curtin went abroad immediately Australia’s war effort would suffer. Observers agree that no one in the Government has the Prime Minister’s cool judgment and grasp of the war situation. “Mr Curtin was easily Asset Number 1 in Labour’s election balancesheet,” says the former Prime Minister, Mr Menzies, enumerating the factors in Labour’s election victory. “The election,” he added, “also demonstrates that the recall of Australia’s forces from abroad and the lines drawn round Australia by the Militia Bill command the support of the majority of Australian voters. Experience shows, too, that Governments are not readily defeated in times of prosperity. Australia’s national income as a result of unprecedented war expenditure is at a record level.”

Opposition survivors are reported to be agreed that their party organisations

throughout Australia must be purged and refashioned. Mr Fadden’s leadership of the Country Party and Mr Hughes's leadership of the United Australia Party are likely to be challenged.