TARANAKI BY-ELECTION

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16341, 12 October 1918, Page 8

TARANAKI BY-ELECTION

WELLINGTON COMMENT. J (SPECIAL TO "THI PIIZSS."} • jj WELLINGTON, October The success of Mr Sydney Smith;»tM. Democratic-Labour candidate, as k called himself, in the Taranaki by-ei§# tion, is occasioning much more mont and speculation than did a simj*' Jar rebuff to the National Government:' in the Wellington Central by-election. It was generally recognised that the feat or tho Government nominee in Wellington Central was due to lack of organisation and effort on the part of the people responsible for putting him in the field, but no suoh explanation can be offered for the defeat or the Govern*"mont candidate in Taranaki. Both, sides were well organised, and both ptll . forth their utmost efforts, the -unofficial figures showing that only some six Iran- 1 drod fewer votes wore polled than wero > recorded four years ago, whon Mr Okey : won by a majority or 11S4. What makes the result all the more., significant is that Mr Smith, unlike tho succespful candidate in Wellington Central, has not quibbled over tho question of loyalty. He is all for winning the warj and for winning it by the only means that appeal to sane members, of tho community. The explanation of tho result offered by people who own to no party bias is that Labour has attracted to its ranks from both tho > other parties, eleDtors who, rightly pff wrongly, believe tho Government made no adequate effort to stay the crease in the cost of living, or to roaiifip tain at their full efficiency the various! services that are necessary for the oom-4 fort of tho settlers and for the con-& tinuod development of tho resources of§ !; tho country. .