N.S.W. Labour Party

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25551, 20 July 1948, Page 4

N.S.W. Labour Party

More evidence of the declining popularity of the Labour Party in New South Wales is provided by its loss of the Kogarah seat at a by-election on Saturday. At the State elections in May last year Labour won the seat with a majority of 3732; the result of Saturday’s poll was a win for the Liberal Party’s candidate by 836 votes. This swing against the Labour Party, estimated at 15 per cent., and the results of earlier byelections, suggest a definite movement of public opinion against Labour. Labour was returned in May last year with a reduced though substantial majority; but a pronounced swing against it was revealed, and Opposition candidates increased their votes even in “ safe ” Labour seats. In the by-election for the Hartley seat at the end of last year the movement against Labour continued. The Labour candidate retained the seat, which is a party stronghold, but the swing away was at least 12 per cent. At the Coogee by-election in May this year the Liberals won the seat, -which Labour had held since 1941, although with declining majorities. The swing then was estimated at 4 per cent. Although it has now lost Kogarah, the Labour Party still holds 49 seats in the Legislative Assembly against the Liberals’ 20. and the Country Party’s 15. With the two Lang Labour seats, its majority over the combined Opposition parties is 13. But the party cannot be optimistic about the future. Liberal supporters may be too enthusiastic in claiming that the drift from Labour is reaching landslide proportions; but there is sufficient proof that it is not a passing phase. It is significant that the Liberal victory was in Kogarah, which is very largely a working-class suburb. There the results of the industrial trouble that has caused such intense public irritation everywhere in Sydney are likely to have been felt more keenly. Coal shortages and gas and power restrictions in one of the coldest winters in Sydney for many years may well be believed to have influenced the electors, particularly the women. And both men and women will have remembered the Government’s inept handling of the contributing disputes.