Main Interest In Banking Issue

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26614, 10 November 1947, Page 5

Main Interest In Banking Issue

A feature of this election is that Victorians, realising that the eyes of the world were upon them in an antisocialisation battle, went very seriously about their task. Labour failed completely in its desperate effort to divert attention from the bank nationalisation issue.

It was obvious that this was the issue on which Victorians voted as it could not be said that Mr John Cain’s State Government was unpopular. But increasing inroads upon State rights by Labour-controlled Canberra have been viewed recently with mounting seriousness. The result was that when Victorians' were given the opportunity at the election to express their views, all other issues were put in the background. Personal popularity and the integrities of individual Labour members were swept aside and the downfall of the Cain Government appeared a certainty even from the earliest election returns received soon after the close of the poll on Saturday night. Labour lost in the city and country alike and the result exceeded the hopes of Opposition supporters. In the city, Labour’s losses were Albert Park, Boxhill, and Essendon, where the Labour member was Mr A. F. Drakeford, a son of the Federal Civil Aviation Minister, Mr A. S. Drakeford, Mentone, and Oakleigh, where Mr S. Reid had been the Labour member for about 15 years. In the country, losses were Dundas, represented by Mr Slater, the Attorney-general for 30 years, Wonthaggi, where even the State coal miners’ vote was unable to save Mr McKenzie, the Minister of Agriculture from the surrounding farmers’ anger at bank nationalisation, Dandenong, where the Education Minister, Mr Fields’ popularity was unavailing, Hampden, Gippsland North, and Mildura.

The defeated Independents, upon whom Mr Cain relied in the last Parliament, were Mr R. A. Gardner and Mr I. F. McLaren, representing respectively Ivanhoe and Gleniris, two

good-class residential suburbs predominantly Liberal in their sympathies.' Even in traditional Labour strongholds the Labour vote was substantially reduced, in some cases surprisingly so. No sitting Liberal member was defeated, and the only Country Party loss was in Mernda. a fruitgrowing district near Melbourne, where Mr L. L. Webster (Country Party) lost to Mr A. E. Ireland (Liberal).

The voting started slowly and was unmarked by. incidents. All hotels remained open and police headquarters received only one call from the electoral officers. A polling booth official of South Yarra was detained by the police after a report by another officer that' he had opened a ballot box an hour before the polling ended and took out a handful of votes. He tearfully explained that he was trying to make a correction at the request of a voter, an immediate inquiry being held.

Although returns from the country were slow in coming in, it was soon apparent that Labour would suffer a reverse and that the Liberals were strong, even in the country areas where formerly the Country Party had been the chief contestant against Labour. Two Independents, on whose votes the Cain Government had been retained in power since the previous election, were the earliest casualties.

LEADERS OF THE VICTORIAN PARTIES