THE CREWE ELECTION.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIII, Issue 180, 29 July 1912, Page 4

THE CREWE ELECTION.

The Tesult of the Crewe by-election is now to hand, and our readers should be interested to Observe that this triangular contest has eventuated in a win for the Unionists. Considering thait the Liberal candidate who won the seat at last election polled 1,700 votes in excess of his Unionist rival, this result, under normal conditions, could hardly have been anticipated. But the explanation, of course, is that this time the anti-Unionist vote was split between a Liberal and a Labour candidate. Tine Unionist who heads the poll fell fhort of an absolute majority by no 1<553 than 1,500 votes; and the anti-Unionist vote at this election iras a little heavier than at the last. But with the LiberalLabour forces divided, there was ample room for the Unionist to coime in between tiiem, and so the Liberal party has lost another eeat. This is certainly unfortunaite, and we have no doubt that most people will agree with us that tnis Liberal defeat is entirely due to the action of the Labour party in attempting to force a candidate into a constituency which had already returned a Liberal by a substantial majority. It will be remembered that the Labour party expressed great indignation at Mr Asquith's Tefusal to withdraw the Ijberal candidate from Crewe and let the Labourite have the field to himself. But as events have turned out. it seems quite clear that the 'Labourite wouW have been hopelessly beaten by the Unionist. For the gTcat majority of the electors who eu[v ported the liberal candidate in this instance would almost certainly have refused to vote for the Labour man. It is always necessary to remind ourselves in discussing English political problems that a very large section of the Liberals are conservative in their sympathies and would rather support the Unionists than the Labour party. It is therefore very difficult to avoid the conclusion that thr Labourites, by insisting upon putting forward a Labour candidate, ruined the labera.l chances at Crewe. It is evident that the labour leaders a.t Home have a great drnl to learn about electioneering tactics befoTe they can hope to make much headway in their progress toward that political supremacy which they have set out to attain.