PARTIES IN BRITAIN

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 80, 28 December 1928, Page 9

PARTIES IN BRITAIN

POSSIBLE POLITICAL DEADLOCK

The possibility of a political deadlock being produced by the next general election in Great Britain as a result of the existence of three parties is generally recognised. Writing in the “Observer” recent!}’ Mr. J. L. Garvin predicted that the Unionists will number half the House or so nearly half that the result of the general election may very well be in effect—under the three-party system —more like a tie than anything known since the memorable situation at the end of 18S5. The strength of the Labour Party is estimated at not less than 250 and might be an}’thing up to 280, but it “as yet has no chance of obtaining an absolute majority in the House of Commons or of forming an independent Government.” Mr. Garvin discounts the speculations regarding the Liberal Party's chance of holding the balance and indirectly controlling a Labour Government and adds: “Imagine the Unionists losing over 120 seats and coming back only about 280 in number. If the Oppositions united at all they would only have a majority of 40, riven inwardly from the start with dissension, suspicion, jealousy and intrigue If Mr. Ramsay MacDonald could bring himself to take office on such terms his plight would be more miserable than that of Mr. Gladstone’s. last Government of 1892 with a similarly exiguous and precarious majority. But could Labour take office at all in such circumstances? It is not likely. Mr. Maxton, with 20 Labour dissentients, counting 40 on a division, would hold the House of Commons in the hollow of his hand and extinguish the drdam. of Liberal domination. If the Unionists do not return with a sufficient working majority, however reduced, the life of the next House of Commons is unlikely to be a long one. The necessities of the King’s service would compel Mr. Baldwin and Mr. MacDonald to approach each other direct. Either Mr. Baldwin might carry on with a non-controversial programme until another general election could be arranged, or Mr. Ramsay MacDonald might carry on in the same way. But in no case can the ‘balance of power’ theory work as simply as most Liberals and some others are tempted to expect.”