“OPERATION POTATO”

Wanganui Chronicle, 20 March 1947, Page 5

“OPERATION POTATO”

FOE OF COMMUNISTS BACKED BY PAPERS IN FIGHT FOR FREEDOM

(Special from C. R.'Mentiplay). Reed. 10 p.m. Sydney, March 19 Mr. E. D. Darby, M.Z.A., central figure in the waterside strike situalien in Sydney row, is the 36-year-old Englishman, Douglas Darby, who is Liberal representative for Manly in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly. He is regarded by th e Communists as their most dangerous foe and by many citizens as the only man who is taking active steps to restore to them .heir potatoes, sugar and salt.

Between these two extremes opinion is di.'ided.

Mr. Da« by, who is good looking and of uuiiy build, first visited Australia in 1926 as a 'ship's steward. Two years later lie was back with scholastic ambitions . which h e at once sst out to realise. He studied at the Sydney Teachers’ Training Cc.iegc and a year later took charge of >ii s first school. In 1934 he took the degree of Bachelor of Economics at. Sydney University. Politics claimed hir interest, but it was not until 1946 that he won the Manly by-election ana resigned as a teacher.

Ou two previous occasions, during the transport strikes late last year and early thi s year, he incurred the wrath of strikers by organising emergency transport. Yesterday, while battling with the Communists in the Sydney Domain, he had to forget for a moment that his wife was waiting to go to hospital to have their second child. Bearing visible marks of the fight, Mr. Darby to-day is planning “Operation Potato,” by which he intends to unload potatoes from three ships immobilised in the port if the Government does not take a hand. He may have to do this without police protection, for Premier McGirr has made no secret of his contention that Mr. Darby’s action in calling a public meeting in the Domain to enlist volunteer labour was incitefnent to mob violence. Mr. Chifiey has condemned rioting by the watersiders, but beyond that there has been no Government reaction.. The newspapers are solidly behind Mr. Darby in urging the State or Federal Government to take action. “The incident demonstrates how far the Communists are determined to go to put pressure on the community so that it will beg for mercy,” says the “Daily Telegraph.” If the Government refuses to give volunteers police protection it endorses the Communists and supporters in their efforts to force I he issue by making the public suffer.”

“Yesterday’s riot was not a spontaneous or isolated affair,” comments the "Sydney Morning Herald.” “It ivas obviously prearranged and was symptomatic of the growth of fraternal violence which, If it be not checked? will become a menace to ciwi liberty and peace." The "Sydney Sun” suggests that the motive of the Communists is to goad the community into action, hoping thus to find some counter organisation which they can denounce as Fascism. “Whether or not Mr. Darby was wise in calling the meeting, no Australian with any love of democratic freedom would wish to rob him or anyone else of the right of free speech," concludes the “Sun.” "It was left to the Communists who hate the Australian idea of freedom to jo that with bludgeons and boots.”