Liberal Leader May Quit

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30948, 3 January 1966, Page 9

Liberal Leader May Quit

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) LONDON, Jan. 2. The leader of the British Liberal Party, Mr Jo Grimond, has decided to give up the leadership of his party after the next election, unless there were another dead-heat or the Liberals won more seats, the “Observer” said today. Mr Grimond, aged 52, had

led the party for nine years. He did not want to hang on unless there was a real prospect of the Liberals achieving greater influence. The last year had been particularly dispiriting for Mr Grimond, the “Observer” said. A bitter blow was the success of the Prime Minister, Mr Wilson, in tempting the Liberal M.P., Mr Roderic Bowen, to take the post of Deputy Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, this depriving him of a vote in the House of Commons.

More important has been the “galling dilemma” which Labour’s General Election victory confronted the Liberal Party. Their ambition has always been to replace Labour as the party of the left. The Liberals were now divided as to whether to form a coalition with Labour or to observe a more strict neutrality. If the Liberals made no progress in the next General Election —and there was every sign of a five-year Parliament—Mr Grimond could be expected to stand down, the “Observer” said.

Student Trapped.— Rescue crews worked throughout last night to try to free a 19-year-old college student trapped by a rock slide in a cave at Lebanon, Tennessee. New York, January 2.