LABOUR'S ADVANCE

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 128, 4 June 1929, Page 9

LABOUR'S ADVANCE

REVIEW BY MR. HOLLAND

FEATURES OF THE ELECTION

(By Telegraph.—Press Association.)

WESTPORT, 3rd June.

Reviewing the political situation in Britain, Mr. H. E. Holland, Leader of the. Labour- Party, said that the 1929 elections result constituted the. greatest revolutionary change in-British, political history. It marked the deposition of a Government that fo«and itse?f wholly incapable- of either shaping its legislative enactments or applying its administrative powers adequately to meet the problems arising out of, the processes of ordinary economic development, on

the oho liand, and on the other hand conditions generated by the logical working out of the unscientific provisions of tho Treaty of Versailles relat-

ing to reparations, etc. Next to the sweeping Labour gains, the Conservative debacle was the main feature- of the election. -

Mr. Baldwin faces a new House with the loss of about 150 seats, and in the large number of cases those of his colleagues who secured election did so i on a minority vote. > The Liberal failure was little less significant than that of the Tories. The new Government with a following that was slightly less than one-half of the full membership of the House would bo confronted with, the most stupendous task ever undertaken by a British Administration, or any other for that matter. But it was needless to say Mr. MaeDonald and

his colleagues would justify the confidence reposed in them by the British electors and by the Labour movement throughout the world. The Labour victory furnished an effective guarantee in the direction of world peace, and made possible the establishment of commercial and political relationships between Britain and other countries, notably Bussia. That would work out to the immense benefit of the people of Britain and all other countries affected. Tho voting on Thursday emphasised the phenomenal advance of the Labour Party, which had moved from a record of less than 62,000 votes and two elected members in 1900 to 151 members and five and a half million votes in 1924, and now to nearly 300 elected representatives and added millions of "votes in 1929., .. ' . .