CENSORSHIP

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 63, 15 March 1944, Page 5

CENSORSHIP

AUSTRALIAN PROBE Method Of Inquiry Widely Criticised N.Z. Press Association—Copyright Rec. 2 p.m. CANBERRA, this day. A Parliamentary committee yrill investigate censorship in Australia. The terms of the inquiry are based on recommendations made to the Government by the Opposition parties. The inquiry will be made by. a committee of Ministers and former Ministers from the Government and Opposition. The committee will report to the Government and not to Parliament. The terms of reference are: "To inquire into and make recommendations to the Government with respect to censorship." The Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Menzies, said the Opposition considered the inquiry should be into all kinds of censorship. He denied the Opposition had failed to recommend a Royal Commission because it feared what might be disclosed in the evidence. (The Prime Minister, Mr. Curtin, had earlier stated the Opposition had evidently had "a second think" about the need for a comprehensive inquiry into censorship.) Wide dissatisfaction with the method of the inquiry is being expressed. The Sydney Morning Herald to-day says in an editorial: "The Government and Opposition, between them alike uneasy in their consciences, have fashioned an instrument for the suppression rather than official exposure of the Gestapolike abuses that have arisen in our midst."