DEMAND BY LABOUR.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 61, Issue 270, 27 August 1941, Page 6

DEMAND BY LABOUR.

MR MENZIES SHOULD RESIGN. NATIONAL CABINET REJECTED. CANBERRA, August 26. The Australian Labour Party to-day demanded that the Prime Minister (Mr R. G. Menzies) should hand in his commission and make way for a Labour administration.

This decision was reached at a caucus of the Labour Party, which rejected Mr Menzies’s offer of half the portfolios in a national government under any leader. The Federal Cabinet sat all the afternoon to consider the challenge, and the meeting is continuing. „

Declaring that the position would not be changed by a reconstruction of the Government, the Labour Leader (Mr J. Curtin) made it clear that Labour was opposed to a composite or coalition Ministry formed by the two Government parties under any other leader.

The summarised decisions of the Labour caucus follow: —

(1) Labour agreed that a workable Parliament was essential for the prosecution of the war.

(2) Labour felt that Mr Menzies’s offer of a National Government indicated that he was unable to provide a stable Government.

(3) Labour disagreed with the view that Mr Curtin would not be able to secure a workable Parliament with political stability. On the contrary, he was entitled to expect the same cooperation in regard to the war as Labour had already given the Menzies Ministry.

(4) Labour considered that Mr Menzies should return his commission and advise the Governor-General of Labour’s views.

The meeting lasted only half an hour, and its verdict was unanimous. Mr Curtin afterwards sent a letter to Mr Menzies, in which he pointed out that the Labour Party, ever since the General Election, had strived to give effect to its pledge to co-operate to the utmost with tlie Government’s war effort and in pursuance of its original undertaking had not taken political advantage of its numerical strength in order to embarrass. the Government. Mr Curtin added: “For this reason alone, although you are the leader of a party of only 24 members, along with 12 Country Party members, making a total of 36, you have been able to continue as head of the Government. All the facts prove that there has been close co-operation between the Government and the Opposition in the war organisation, in addition to which Labour has placed at the disposal of Ministers the services of individual members.’’ Mr Curtin indicated that the dissension which had lately emerged had nof been caused by Labour but by certain Government supporters, and the position would not be changed by a reconstruction of the Government. It was entirely wrong to assume, added Mr Curtin, that an all-party Government was necessary to ensure stability, since that type of Government did not exist while Mr Menzies was in London. Labour opposed an all-party Government because it would stifle honest, patriotic criticism without which a successful war effort was impossible.