BEGUN AGAIN

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 118, 21 May 1945, Page 4

BEGUN AGAIN

DEBATE ABOUT EQUIPMENT Rec. 9 a.m. CANBERRA, May 19. " Allegations that the Acting Army Minister, Senator Fraser, had spoken "a mouthful of lies" in his report on Australian army equipment were read in the House of Representatives by Mr J. P. Abbott (Country Party, New South Wales). The writer, a heuten-, ant-colonel serving on the Aitape front in New Guinea, said: "The only time we have been well-equipped was when we were under British command." Mr. Abbott said he would give the officer's name in confidence to the Acting Prime Minister, Mr. J. B. Chifley, but would not disclose it in the House. Mr. Abbott added: "I will not divulge his name to the House or to the military authorities, because I don't want him mangled by the Gestapo. "' The officer, in his letter to Mr. Abbott, said: "Politicians like Fraser will never get to the bottom of anything. We ' will only be completely equipped when we are once again under British military command." Mr. Abbott said his informant stated that the bombers which were now being used were out of date. Mr. Abbott added that the Evidence being received by Opposition members of the shortage of army equipment in New Guinea was too great and too frequent to be disregarded. The Minister in charge of the House, Mr. Makin, said that the Government had provided "'a most effective and smashing reply to all the innuendoes, suggestions, and allegations made by the Opposition about equipment shortages." Mr. Abbott: But the troops are still short of equipment.