A GENERAL ELECTION

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 87, Issue 41, 19 February 1943, Page 4

A GENERAL ELECTION

’T’ilE Hon. J. G. Barclay’s statement that “if the war goes on as at present I think an election this year would be a good idea, and I am half expecting it,” is a half-hearted admission that a general election is necessary. The Minister for Marketing does not appear to see the significance of the Christchurch East byelection, which was a moral defeat for the Government, seeing that more electors voted against than for the Government. The Government has, therefore, no ground for claiming that it holds a mandate for remaining in office, and Mr. Fraser’s claim that the result of the by-election was satisfactory to the Government, has no application to the facts of the present situation. The Government is now in duty bound to refrain from placing obstacles in the way of the public saying who shall govern the country. When the general elections were first postponed it was because the war situation was by no means easy to assess. The decision might have been justified on that account, and it was not seriously challenged. It was not. justified in 1942 because the action was taken on the ground of political expediency, and that same point of view appears to dominate the mind of Mr. Barclay when he regards the holding of the general elections this year as a good idea. The arrangement, was entered into between the political leaders .to refrain from holding the general elections until a. year following the close of the war, but the public disapproval, led by the Press, was so strong that the proposal was modified to the, extent that the matter should be. reviewed annually in Parliament. ’lhe matter must, therefore, he discussed on the floor of the House, presumably on a motion of the Prime Minister, that the life of Parliament should again be extended, or terminated, at the end of the current year. The public has already registered its protest against, the extension of the life of Parliament for the term of the. duration of the war; it has already registered its dissatisfaction with the Government, particularly in the Bay of Plenty and the Christchurch East by-elections. It can do no more than it has done. It is for the Government to recognise the facts and not gloss them over as “satisfactory” simply because in the last contest its candidate, through the intervention of the most, effective elements of the. Cabinet—who look time off to engage in electioneering—topped the poll. If the Cabinet, can find the time to go by-electioneering, then it is demonstrated that the war effort is not a barrier to the holding of a general election.