THE CABINET

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 25061, 18 December 1946, Page 6

THE CABINET

Two New Members Elected MR HACKETT AND MR CULLEN

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, Dec. 17. Two new members of the Cabinet were elected by a caucus of the Parliamentary Labour Party to-day. They are:

Mr E. L, Cullen, member for Hastings.

Mr F. Hackett, member for Grey Lynn.

The Cabinet as at present constituted is: Prime Minister (the Rt. Hon. P. Fraser), the Rt. Hon. W. Nash, the Hon. D. G. Sullivan, the Hon. H. G. R. Mason, the Hon. R. Semple, the Hon. W. E. Parry, the Hon. F. Jones, the Hon. A. H. Nordmeyer. the Hon. J. O’Brien, the Hon. C. F. Skinner, the Hon. A. McLagan, the Hon. E. T. Tirikatene, and Messrs Cullen and Hackett The questions of the leadership of the Legislative Council and that of the party’s nominee for the position of Speaker of the House of Representatives were postponed until a later date.

Mr Cullen was born at Havelock North and was educated at the Nuhaka Native School and the Napier Boys High School. He served for three years in the Great War in the New Zealand Rifle Brigade as a sergeant in the 4th Battalion and was awarded the M.M. After his return from the war he took up farming in the Wairoa district. He was one of the original founders of the Wairoa Herd-testing Association and was twice director of the Wairoa Co-operative Dairy Company, Ltd. He unsuccessfully contested the Hqwke’s Bay seat as a Labour candidate in 1931. He won it in 1935 and held it until the last election, when he stood for and won the Hastings Mr Hackett is 45 years of age. He left school at a very early age, having passed the necessary school leaving examination. He was engaged on a ship transporting refugees from Antwerp and Ostend during World War 1., and at a later stage was a gunner in the Navy. He was married in Dunedin in 1923, and is the father of three sons and one daughter. . Going to Auckland shortly after his marriage, he joined the Auckland Transport Board, and was an active member of the Tramwaymen’s Union for many years, holding every office in the union, and when he was elected to Parliament in 1943 he was national president of the New Zealand Tramwaymen’s Union. He has been the chairman of the Auckland Rehabilitation Committee since its inception, and is also chairman of the Blinded Servicemen ’s Trust Board.