Nelson Evening Mail FRIDAY, JUNE 25, 1943 AUSTRALIAN POLITICS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 78, 25 June 1943, Page 4

Nelson Evening Mail FRIDAY, JUNE 25, 1943 AUSTRALIAN POLITICS

since it assumed office in October, 1941, the Curtin Government in Australia has rested precariously on the knife-edge of a slender majority. That is ticklish enough for any Government, yet, before Mr Curtin had time to chart his course, Japan came into the war and his administration was faced with the unprecedented task of organising thq •defence of the Commonwealth against a dire threat of invasion. Out of that supreme test it has emerged with credit. The "Sydney Morning Herald” coipmented the other day that only a bigot would deny that the work done and the measures taken by the Curtin Government had played a strong part in ensuring Australia's security. The Prime Minister himself has increased his political stature since he has been in office. ,Some members of his Cabinet have not done so and, in carrying out the difficult measures which are inevitable in mobilising a total war effort, he has not always had their undivided loyalty, apart from shortcomings in administrative capacity. Further than that, party wrangling, which Australians seem to enjoy even more than other virile democracies, has not been subdued by the menace of the enemy from without. Political sniping is always bound to be more telling when a small loss of voting strength would either bring the Opposition back or precipitate an election.

That, in fact, is what has now happened in Australia. After surviving by a single vote the no-confidence motion following a prolonged and acrimonious debate, Mr Curtin whose much-tried patience is apparently at an end, sprung a surprise by announcing that he will shortly seek a dissolution and a Federal election is expected in August- This decision seems to. have been clinched by developments in the much-discussed

“Brisbane Line” controversy in which Mr Curtin's Minister of Labour (Mr E. J. Ward) has constantly embarrassed his colleagues by making allegations he has now been constrained to withdraw, at the same time being suspended lor his painsAt intervals since last October Mr Ward has maintained that Labour’s predecessors in office had been ready to abandon the greater part of Australia to the enemy “without firing a single shot.” The reference is to a defence plan drawn up by Sir Iven Mackay, who was appointed Com-mander-in-Chief of the Australian Home Forces by the Menzies Government. It involved concentrating on a defence line running from Brisbane across Australia to somewhere north of Adelaide. Official correspondence has shown that this plan was never submitted to the Fadden Government, which followed the Menzies administration, but came before Mr Forde, present Minister for the Army, and was rejected, the return of the A.I.F. and the set-up under General MacArthur being the sequel. Nothing was known of the “Brisbane Line” proposal by the present Federal Opposition until it was disclosed at a meeting of the Australian War Council in February, 1942, more than four months after Labour took office. Since revealing what many thought should have been kept a military secret Mr Ward has lost no opportunity of publicly charging the Opposition with willingness to conduct Australia’s defence on such a defeatist plan. When Mr Curtin tardily published the facts Mr Ward was not satisfied and then resorted to the “missing document” allegation, which he has now had to abandon. In order to clear them from the imputations the Opposition asked for a Royal Commission, to which Mr Curtin consented. While the “Brisbane Line” and the unscrupulous Mr Ward have brought the Federal political crisis to a head they are far from being the only issues involved and Mr Curtin has chosen to try and end an intolerable situation by an appeal to the country.