EATAN-SWILL-IANA.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 95, 23 April 1931, Page 19

EATAN-SWILL-IANA.

belgravia and PIMLICO VOTE u XNSOI<ENT PLUTOCRATS' NOMINEE." DEFEAT FOR THE PRESS BARONS. (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, March 20. A Pickwickian election. St. George's, Westminster, resounded last night to the loud speaker and big drum as the rival Tory candidates marshalled their supporters to the polling booth.. The' climax came at 11 o clock at Caxton Hall, in Victoria Street, where "some" thousands or ten thousand shouted themselves hoarse,' and carried. Mr. Duff Cooper and Lady Diana shoulder high -svhen his poll of 17,242 and majority of 5710 was announced. The anti-Baldwin partv, the- . "Gandhi-is-watching-St.-Geonre's" dervishes, had got their quietus. A two thousand majority was the best hoped for —but this! What did it mean? Above and Below Stairs. St. George's is- a constituency with i>ne foot set in the, slums of Pimlico and the other in aristocratic Belgravia. How would it poll ? No one knew. On the one hand, it is the residential area of leading Conservatives. They were all aghast at the antics of the Beaver-brook-Rothermere circus and cast their votes for Mr, Duff Cooper, the official Conservative candidate. On the other hand, below stairs in Belgravia, was an unknown quantity. The army of "tweenies" and all the higher ranks in domestic staffs,' thousands of parlourmaids, housemaids, and cooks, controlled by butlers more-majestic of mien than their masters, what would they, especially the women voters—enfranchised so lately by Mr. Baldwin—do? Certainly thev read the "Daily Mail" and the "Daily Express." Were th§v going to react to the mass-suggestion of the millionaire Press? ' Would the best wooer of the pantry vote win? They reacted to the number of 11,532. They voted for Sir Ernest Petter, who, be it Gaid, was a candidate personally liked, and who on his own merits might have got more support. One of the leading authorities said to-day: "While the few approaches which the mass-suggestion Press was able to make to serious polities were all in delirious vein,. ! yet, from the moment that Sir Ernest Petter became its mascot, there was clearly a," serious national issue to be settled in St. George's." Well, Belgravian voters above and below stairs, and the workers of Pimlico, have spoken. ' . A "Soft" Candidate. The- struggle since March 6 has ocen a daily "revue," the Beaverbrook Press calling Mr. Duff Cooper "Mr. Cooper" in an-effort to annoy him, and heading his protest against this with another "Mr. Cooper." "The same day the Rothermere -Press had begun its campaign- by charging Mr. Duff Cooper with '•apologising" for the British Empire in "an ex-enemy capital"—Berlin. No amount of explanation to the propagandist Press which scorns the classics .would make .-them admit , that "apologia" was used fit- Cooper in its proper dictionary literary sense, of a vindication. Mr. Baldwin's letter to Mr. Duff Cooper in support of his candidature spoke of .Lords Beaverbrook and Rothermere as "insolent plutocrats," and the "Daily Mail's"', "retort was" to call Mr. Duff Coopers "softy."" - This is the softy he was. Lieutenant Duff Cooper displayed, according to the "London Gazette," "conspicuous gallantry.'" When the remainder of his com- j pany lost direction, he led the rest against a machine-gun., post The . four j men him were- -shot, so- he attacked the post alone and "compelled the surrender of 18 men and two machine-guns.'L Later, with a patrol of six men, he succeeded in capturing S9 prisoners. Mr: Duff Cooper may 5e pardoned, perhaps, for saying of Lord Rothermere that he had not "the guts of a louse," or that Mr. Baldwin was provoked into calling -the "Daily Mail' editor a cadi.?—. The public .was- not impressed when Lord' Beaverbrook told the. voters of St. George's that Lord Rothermere had given .two sons-"in the Great War. die appeared to forget how many others had given their sons and their all. But, in fine, the last infamy of this Eatanswill electioii was the setting up of Gandhi as a bogvman. and the noble proprietoreditor of the- "'Daily Mail" deserves everything he . .gets for making India the plaything of party politics, when even Mr. Churchill, who would dare anything, stopped on the threshold of a fiery phillipic on India and the Government's policy there, and sat down, his prearranged, speech unspoken, so convincing was Mr. Baldwin in his support of - Lord Irwin and the Government of India policy. * That in conjunction with the duplicity of the Press c fords iff running a" campaign for foreign trade while boosting Empire trade here, lost them the fight.