REPRESENTATIVE IN N.Z.

Press, Volume LXXIX, Issue 24095, 3 November 1943, Page 2

REPRESENTATIVE IN N.Z.

Action by Australian Government HIGH COMMISSIONER APPOINTED (P.A.) WELLINGTON, November 2. The announncement that the Commonwealth Government had appointed the Hon. T. G. de L. Dalton ,as High Commissioner for Australia and New Zealand was made by the DeputyPrime Minister (the Hon. W. Nash) today. “The experience of the eight .months during which the New Zealand High Commissioner (Mr C. A. Berendsen) has been at his post,” said Mr Nash, "has given further proof of the value of having a political representative at hand qualified to interpret the Government’s viewpoint on day to day problems and on larger issues of mutual concern. It is a matter of great satisfaction that the Commonwealth Government has now found it possible to complete the exchange of representatives initiated by New Zealand. “As the war effort in the Pacific gathers momentum and as the tasks of constructing an adequate peace in the Pacific loom up, New Zealand and Australia are being brought into ever closer and more urgent contact. At such a time the New Zealand Government welcomes the appointment of a man who stands so high in the political life of Australia and in the esteem of the Commonwealth Government. Mr Dalton has been a member of the Legislative Assembly since 1931. has held various Ministerial posts in the Tasmanian Government, and for the last two years ha? been Deputy Premier of that State.” Mr Dalton’s appointment was announced in Australia by Dr. Evatt, Minister of External Affairs. He said that Australia hnd New Zealand had to face the same basic problems, both in the prosecution of the war against Japan, and in preparing for the future security and development of a very large part of the Pacific area. Mr Dalton’s “attractive and energetic personality’’ would greatly assist the understanding by New Zealanders of Australia’s point of view. Mr Dalton is aged 48. He has held the portfolios of Chief Secretary of the Minister of Transport, Minister of Agriculture, and Minister of Commerce and Industry for the last two years., He is a former president of the Tasmanian-Australian Labour Party, and delegate to the Federal Australian Labour Party. He was born in Victoria, but he spent most of his life in Tasmania, where he worked in the Mount Lyell railway workshops.