ELECTION RUMOURS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 168, 18 July 1941, Page 7

ELECTION RUMOURS

Mr. Menzies Repudiates Press

Suggestions TALK BV LABOUR MEMBERS SYDNEY, July 17. The Prime Minister. Mr. Menzies. has repudiated a suggestion in the daily Press that the Government is considering the holding of a general election. All the talk and fuss about the prospect of an early election, he added, was coming from the deputyleader of the Federal Labour party. Mr. F. M. Forde. and his colleagues.

Mr. Menzies said he was quite sure the people of Australia would resent another election at this stage. He hoped the Labour members who were advocating an election would cut the political cackle and facilitate the Government's task of speeding up the war effort.

Mr. Forde's talk about taking over the Broken Hill Companj-'s industries was dubbed by Mr. Menzies as trailing a red herring. He said it simply could not be done.

Mr. Menzies defended the Broken Hill Company's efforts in the war. He spoke of its endeavours to supply the Government's needs of raw materials at the minimum cost and the vastness of its output of steel products with the least possible delay. Xo sensible person, ne said, could imagine that a batch of amateurs could be iittc-d into the places of those responsible for the direction of the company's heavy industries with anything like the degree of Mucess which marked the company'-; operations. Indeed, the Australian people v.oulfl not countenance Mi. Forde's idea of political control of an industry which constituted the very foundation of the war effort.