POLITICAL CRISIS

Evening Star, Issue 24278, 20 August 1942, Page 4

POLITICAL CRISIS

APPROACHING IN AUSTRALIA , A MAJOR SHOWDOWN LIKELY (N.Z.P.A. Special Aust. Correspondent) SYDNEY. Aug. 19. “ Parliament can either accept my administration or get another one he Prime Minister, Mr J. Cmtin, ha., dt dared. The controversy over the censorship, combined with the recent Opposition criticism of certain hcdoial Ministers responsible tor mdustiW‘ organisation, may provoke a major showdown in Austmhu. uoSvers consider that Mr Curtin’s declaration means that the Government would welcome during the ?P'. 11 ‘ n 1 g t^st sion of Parliament any political test, possibly to lengths involving a general election as soon as the war crcumremarks were provoked by recent complaints by the Deputy Loader of the Opposition. Mi M. M. Hughes, that he has been a victim of ‘‘ political censorship. These complaints have been followed b;V. newspaper controversy. Mb lie 1 arliainent accepts my administration I expect support from all sections of the country.” the Prime Minister said. 11 1 do not expect consistent sniping from men who, when in office, practised everv one of the vices they are apparently now discovering. lam more than ever convinced that the Japanese had sonic knowledge of the attack on the Soknnous. There were men yelling for offensives when they knew these were being undertaken. 1 shall treat anv attack on the Government m relation to the conduct of the war as a vital issue, and I am not going to wait six months for crumbling ar.a whiteanting ’ to set in.” . ~ In a statement on the censorship Air Curtin said all external communications and regulations were formulated hv the Menzics Government, of which Air Hughes was .a member, and the present Government was standing to them. The Chief Publicity Censor, Mr K G. Bonney, was carrying out Ins work with " groat capacity and patriotism.” It was known that some members'of Cabinet desire an election as soon as one can he contrived because they believe the result would be a substantial Labour majority. Parliament was elected in September, 1940, and still has a year to run. Following Air Curtin’s remarks the Leader of the Opposition. Mr A. W. Fadden. has announced the calling of a special meeting of the Opposition executive. The Opposition, he said, desired to combat attempts to introduce Socialism without an electoral mandate. Mr Warwick Fairfax has resigned from the Australian Press Advisory Committee on Censorship in consequence of Mr Hughes’s complaints of “political censorship” in the despatches of his statements sent beyond Australia. Mr Hughes’s statements cabled to New Zealand were not cut by the censor. -Realising that New Zealand had a vital interest in Australian matters, as well as in the common war problems shared by the two dominions, the Australian censorship authorities recently agreed that the regulations governing publication in New Zealand of nil news from this source should be the same as for publication within Australia.