ELECTION VOTES

New Zealand Herald, Volume 80, Issue 24760, 7 December 1943, Page 2

ELECTION VOTES

THE SERVICE POLL i LABOUR PARTY BENEFITS i A DECIDING FACTOR The important influence which ser- , vice votes had on the result of the general election in September is reflected in the final returns which have just been completed. On the civilian voting the Labour and National Parties each had a lead in 40 of the 80 electorates but, with the addition of service votes, Labour gained five more seats and an Independent, one, at the expense of the Nationalists. The strength of the parties in the new House will be: Labour, 45; National, 34; Independent. 1. The electorates in which the leading candidate was changed as the result of the service voting were: Eden, Palmers ton North, Otaki, Wairarapa, Oamaru and ' Nelson. AH went to Labour except Nelson, which was retained by the sitting Independent, Mr. H. Atmore. A summary of the service voting is as follows: —Labour, 48,987; National. 32,668; Democratic Labour, 6177; others, 41586; total, 92,218. Labour Loses Ground Apart from the service voting, Labour lust ground fairly heavily throughout the Dominion compared with the I support accorded the party in 1938. On the other hand, the National Party made a substantial gain, although the returns would suggest that most of the lost Labour votes went to the Democratic Labour Party which was not in existence in 1938 and was formed by dissentient Labour Party members. Labour, in 1938, gained 55.83 per cent of the total valid votes polled, compared with 47.56 per cent at the recent election. The National Party secured 40.27 per cent of the total votes in 1938, compared with 43.53 per cent 1 this year. The Democratic Labour Party | was supported by 4.33 per cent of the i total electorate, the People's .Movement by 0.79 per cent, tne Heal Democracy Movement by 0.63 per cent, and Independents by 3.16 per cent. Voting Analysed In obtaining the 1943 figures several small totals for Independent Labour and Independent Democratic Labour I candidates in the Maori electorates have | been allocated to the general Independent total as there were official candidates of these parties in the same electorates, but two larger votes for Independent National candidates have been allocated to the National Party as they had the party's official support. A comparison .of the votes received by the major parties at the last two elections is as follows: nil.'! i 1038 Variation Labour 4 IT, 507 528,200 -80,783 National 100..-.77 381,081 +28,-100 Democratic Lab -in.7!l +4O 711 Others 13,118* 30,042 +G.170 ♦lncluding People's Movement, 7458, and Real Democracy Movement. 5010. Dividing the total number of votes cast by the number of seats gives an average electorate of 11,761. Taking this as a quota would give the parties the following representation, compared with the number of members actually returned:— Proportion Returned Labonr .. 3S 45 National . , 35 34 Democratic Labour . 3 0 Independents 3 1 Others ... 1 0 Towns and Country Although the National Party gained several seats in the cities and main provincial centres, Labour still had the major following in the urban areas and held many of these seats by comfortable margins. The trend away from Labour in the country districts, begun in the Waikato in 1938, has become more marked, whereas the National Party has improved its rural vote generally and captured several seats from sitting Labour members. With a few exceptions, candidates of the Democratic Labour Party, Real Democracy .Movement and People's Movement gained little support either in town or country. Details of the voting for the major parties in the urban and rural areas are as follows: Urban electorates (four metropolitan areas and suburbs): Labour, 220,014; National, 160,114; majority for Labour, 59,900. Areas outside of the four centres:— Labour, 227,493; National, 249,463; majority for National. 21,970. Urban electorates, including provincial centres (Hamilton, Gisborne. Napier, Hastings, New Plymouth, Wanganui, Palmerston North, Nelson, Timaru, Invercargill): Labour, 286.315; National. 216.436; majority for Labour, 69.909. Rural electorates (including Maori electorates): —Labour, 167,213; National, 193,141; majority for National, 25,928. Excluding the Maori electorates, the National majority is increased to 34.587.