REVOLT AGAINST REDS

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVII, Issue 9, 8 December 1926, Page 14

REVOLT AGAINST REDS

MR LANG AND HIS PARTY. THE INSURGENT FOLLOWERS. NEW SOUTH WALES CRISIS. SYDNEY, Nor. 25. The past seven days have been a critical time for the Lang Government in New South Wales, through the revolt of three of its supporters, and indeed it is not yet out of the wood. For the past three or four months the dissatisfaction of country members of the Labour Party has been increasing, and following the abortive attempt to wrest the leadership from Mr Lang m September through the decision of caucus, the discontent simmered until the special conference of the party a fortnight ago vested in Mr Lang the leadership of the party for the remainder of the life of this Parliament. It was not long before the blow fell. The recognised leader of the country members, Mr P. F. Loughlin, then Minister of Lands, flung the gauntlet down to his leader by resigning his portfolio last Thursday. To an excited Assembly the next day he recited his reasons, in calm, phlegmatic tones that carried evidence of his earnestness and sincerity. In brief, the reasons were that Mr Lang had persisted in exercising a dictatorship in Parliament and among his party, while ho had allowed himself to be subjugated to a dictatorship of the extreme industrialist section outside Parliament. He demanded that as the price of allegiance Mr Lang should either resign from the leadership or rid himself from the incubus of his outside influences. Everyone knew that by “outside” influences Mr Loughlin meant Mr J. S. Garden and his group of Communist friends, between whom and Mr Lang the link is Mr A. C. Willis, a member of the Legislative Council, and VicePresident of the Executive Council. In party conclaves, Mr Loughlin demanded that Mr Willis should disappear from the Ministry. Meanwhile, the Premier’s staunchest henchman, the Attorney-General, Mr McTiernan, acting as a go-between, had secured a promise from Mr Loughlin not to opSose an adjournment of the House until londay, on condition that sincere efforts were made during the week-end to eradicate Mr Loughlin’s ground for complaint. THE MEETING OF CAUCUS. What dramatic negotiations went on during the week-end are not yet fully known. What is known is this — Caucus met and referred the question of the endorsement of Mr Lang’s leadership to the Australian Labour Party’s executive. The executive interpreted it in the only possible way. that Mr Lang had been given full power for the next 18 or 20 months. Representatives went to Messrs Loughling, Goodin and Gillies, beseeching them not to wreck the Labour Government. They remained adamant. Others went to Mr Lang to ask. him to resign. He remained equally adamant. At midnight on Sunday, after more than 48 hours of intense negotiation, .it remained plain that the issue must be fought out on the floor of the House.

And it was. On the Monday, before crowded galleries and a full House, with the atmosphere electrical with expectancy, the most gripping incident of New South Wales politics was given the full glare of publicity. The three insurgents 'Stuck to their guns, and on an early motion to decide whether a censure motion by the Leader of the Opposition should be treated as a matter of urgency, they voted with the Opposition, and the Lang Government met its first defeat in the Assembly by 45 votes to 44, an Independent voting with the Government. That seemed to presage a Certain Government defeat on the major motion, bub it was not to' be. The gunpowder plot proved to be a squib.

MR LANG STAVES OFF DEFEAT.

After many speeches ,had been made, including those of the three insurgents, and after Mr Lang had promised to reconstruct his Budget, excluding the drastio proposals against which the Country Labour members had so determinedly fought, a vote was taken and the Government won by 44 votes to 42, and an adjournment was granted until Monday. This happy result—for the Lang Government —was achieved by the three iebels absenting themselves from the division. This action they took on the promise of an election within four months, but even this is now said by the newspaper representatives closest to Mr Lang’s confidence, the political correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald, to be improbable.