CONSERVATIVE PARTY

Grey River Argus, 16 March 1945, Page 7

CONSERVATIVE PARTY

Mr Churchill’s Lead for GENERAL ELECTIONS LONDON, March 14. Mr. Churchill made a speech to the Conservative -Party conlerence, on Thursday. Already, the Labour and Liberal 'parties have held their conferences, and indicated their policies. When Mr. Churchill .speaks it is expected he will reveal the main lines on which the Conservative Party will fight a general election.. Then another stage in the prelude to a general election will be completed, and the political atmosphere may be- expected to become a little warmer. 'Though there has been increasing space devoted to political news in newspapers, it cannot be said that the British public as a whole have yet displayed any intensity of feeling oyer prospects of an election that will come later when the war against Germany has ended. In conteplating. Mr. Churchill’s address to the Conservative Party in the session this week, it can be observed that.the scene is somewhat relished by opponents of Conservatives, or of Tories, as they prefer to call them. With ironic smiles they are now remembering the days before the war when Mr. Churchill’s name was anathema to Conservatives who now see in him an election winner. Mr. Michael Foot, 'known as the “Daily Heralds” biting columnist has composed an “extract” of a speech which he guarantees Mr. Churchill will not deliver to the conference. It includes such remarks as, “no doubt, there are seated 11 this, hall persons in the confidence of the Conservative Central? Office who energetically ntrigued (before the war) !o secure my removal from Pari-nmeat, but I must not be harsh. Were no; these persons executing the overwhelming desire of the great bulk of our party ” Mr. Foot’s “extract” also includes a suggestion that says Mr. Churchill became leader of the Conservatives because he wa's not sure that appeasers would not flag or fail—in brief, because he could not trust their loyalty towards him. A “Manchester Guardian’s” diplomatic correspondent also relishes the irony of the scene, and declares that a majority of Conservative delegates will cheer him as “the great election asset.” The correspondent expresses the opinion that Mr. Churchill, who remains aristocrat, of course, is not the Tories true leader, not bone of their bone and flesh of their flesh.” He suggests: “The Tori'; Party during this century ceased to be th e party of the aristocrats and the landed gentry, and became a party of plutocrats and big business. Wealth and big business are not Churchill’s gods. In the years when he was out of office, he did not take to city dictatorships, though he was reported to be a comparatively poor man. He took to painting. In Mr. Churchill the Tories smell an infidel, or rather they suspect, and rightly, that he is not the hundred per cent, true faith. With this background in mind, the Conservatives conference will be watched with wide interest. It will last two days, and consider fifty-one resolutions, which have been telescoped into sixteen main resolutions.” LONDON, March 14 At a meeting of the Conservative Party Central Council, Sir George Courthope was elected President, succeeding the Marquess of Salisbury. Mr. Butler was elected Chairman of the Council for the coming year. At the Party Conference Mr. Butler said they would not? be irrevocably tied to this or that theory, or committed to dangerous untried experiments. The Party desired maximum liberty of action for the individual, but was ready to adapt itself to changing calls from the modern world. It was resolved that housing migh’t have to be provided with municipal and Government grants to help people only able to pay the. lowest rents but that private enterprise should be encouraged to play a full part, and as many citizens as possible be enabled by means of loans'to buy their own homes. LAYING IT ON WITH A TROWEL iMr. Butler moved and the conference carted a motion which praised Mr. Churchill for magnificient leadership of the nation during the war, and congratulated him on the great success already achieved as the result of his efforts, and pledged constant loyal support of the Party in the united movement now in progress for the overthrow of the tyrannical enemies of freedom in Europe and Asia. The resolution was carried unanimously with cheers. Mr. Butler said: “We thank Mr. Churchill for resounding achievements. We pledge him our abidingsupport in a stern period ahead, in which enemies of freedom will be finally overthrown. We can look back to-day on the panorama of his achievements. We remember the patience with which he gained first the affection and. then the overwhelming support of two great figures who are heads of the United. States of America and Soviet Russia. We remember the Atlantic meeting Teheran, Moscow and Yalta conferences. This has been diplomacy on a grand scale. Its fruits have been seen in concerted plans now yielding their historical results. This island and the British Commonwealth, for whose preservation we always stood, followed the leader whose position in the councils of the world has much in common with that of his distinguished ancestors. The Duke pi Marlborough used to be seen now m Europe, now in the midst of political life in England—ever travel stained, ever ready to transact business or the moment, whether domestic or foreign. When Mr. Churchill sits as one of the triumvirs, who are deciding the future of the world let us give him that buoyant feeling which can only come from confidence that a stout company of friends believe i’ l him. We ask him to bring the. same sense of realism into the solution ot foreign and domestic problems ot peace as he has infused into the national war effort. The public are always ready to take from him the hardest home truths as to what we can carry out and what is in the realm of fancy. Our greatest testing time lies ahead. Britain’s future win be made or unmade in the next few years and the eyes of the world are upon us. shey know as they did in 1940 that tlwlr fate is bound up with ours. C»i it be wondered at that we offer the master builder ou help in this his latest greatest worn .—our national reconstruction. ’