Election Fight At Climax In Holland

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27992, 12 June 1956, Page 13

Election Fight At Climax In Holland

(Rec. 8 p.m.) THE HAGUE, June 10.

Holland’s traditional political calm is beginning to be ruffled as the major parties manoeuvre into final position for the first general election in four years next Wednesday. Six million voters will go to the polls to elect a new ICO-ipember Lower House of Parliament.

Ten parties are fighting the election The campaign has been quiet, but now. with three days to go, the two big parties—the Roman Catholics and the Socialists—are bickering electoraliv over domestic issues which might mean the end of their coalition in government for the first time since the war. The outcome depends, according to political observers, on only a few thousand votes which could make the country’s strongest. The Socialists, known as the Party of Labour, won the last General Elec-

tion bv 16.000 votes, but they received only 30 seats in the Chamber, the same number as the Catholic Party. This was the first time in 35 years that the Catholic People’s Party had been outvoted.

The Socialists are trying to break through the tie between religion and politics.

They want political parties on the British pattern instead of denominational parties and much of their success four years ago came from Roman Catholics who voted Labour for the first time.

The Catholic Party, now more firmly united than in 1952 when a splinter party deprived them of many votes, defend denominational parties with the same determination as the Protestants.

There are no burning issues apart from the struggle between “denominational" and “political" parties. But the major parties are manoeuvring on domestic questions awaiting the at-

tention of the next government, such as that of raising rents on houses built before the war.

Many political observers believe that the Catholic Party will emerge as the country's largest, now that it no longer has to contend with a strong splinter group Should this happen, some Socialists —but not the whole Labour Party—have already indicated that they would prefer to go into opposition than form another coalition under the Catholic Party and again compromise their principles.