FARMERS, MIDDLE CLASSES REDUCED LABOR MAJORITY
WILLIAMS, DAVID C.
Report From Britain: FARMERS, MIDDLE CLASSES REDUCED LABOR MAJORITY By DAVID C. WILIAMS New Leader Correspondent in Britain LONDON THE BRITISH ELECTION HAS TURNED OUT TO BE THE MOST CLOSELY...
...In a record-breaking poll 84 per cent of the electorate, Labor won 46.4 per cent of the votes cast, only 1.5 per cent less than in 1945...
...e. fellow-travelers) were eliminated from Parliament...
...Conservative candidates, running under a variety of labels, won almost 44 per cent of the votes cast, nearly 4 per cent up on their 1948 achievement...
...Labor has been very generous with them, and could not afford any further largesse...
...The public opinion polls, which since the Truman victory must be recognized as having a substantial impact on the results of elections, undoubtedly hurt the Liberals...
...The only thing, in my view, which could have maintained or improved Labor's beachhead in the middle-class would have been a pledge to reduce taxes, and this the Government is not in position to make...
...Liberal intervention in three-cornered contests was therefore much less useful to Labor than five years ago...
...Attlee in West Walthamstow...
...But this yielded it only 315 seats as compared with almost four hundred in 1945, and gave it a majority over all other parties in Parliament of only seven...
...With nothing but foreign policy to plug, he got a mere 704 votes...
...Only Stalin and Molotov could have defeated them, as in fact they did...
...Laboi^<yfcLi#ven tetter than expected in industrial and mining areas, particularly where there had been large-scale unemployment before a^nJF^BiS^^^^a^rttl^Lareas, and a heavy swing*!* the mUdI?^|bjs»uburbs of big cities, particularly ho9 f/M There was tendency for labor to '|gp weak in the nearly 200 "new" constituencies— that is, constituencies created *y...
...eyJ^JeVTBisJs^UWJftpL^crtairuy appears to nave hurt Labor, ahd hot only because it eliminated a dozen "safe" Labor seats altogether...
...As for the farmers, here as elsewhere they are even more likely than other groups to define gratitude as the expectation of future favors...
...The Liberals were down to a little over 9 per cent, and this vote was spread thinly over 475 constituencies, rather than concentrated on 300odd, as in 1945...
...As in Australia, Labor appear* to have had the greatest difficulty in "new" seats...
...Don't waste yOur vote...
...Few Communists got even so much is a thousand votes, and almost alt their 100 candidates will lose* their deposits...
...their case, they Would have to «tow what Other approach could have been made...
...This was clearly shown by Lester Hutchinson (one of the group of "representative Europeans" who toured the country with Henry Wallace, condemning American foriegn policy...
...With their much greater number of paid organizers, the Tories seem to have done a better job getting things into shape here...
...Indeed, over 300 Liberal pgpjfji^yralost their $420 deposits by failing to gain as much as one-eighth of the votes cast...
...Showing the Tories and Labor run neck-and-neck, they reinforced the constantly repeated Tory appeal to would-be- Liberal voters: "The issue is socialism...
...I^abor was not uniformly effective in whipping into shape its organizations in the "new" constituencies...
...Report From Britain: FARMERS, MIDDLE CLASSES REDUCED LABOR MAJORITY By DAVID C. WILIAMS New Leader Correspondent in Britain LONDON THE BRITISH ELECTION HAS TURNED OUT TO BE THE MOST CLOSELY CONTESTED ONE *N A CENTURY...
...Some observers blame the concentration on this issue for the poorer Labor showing in the rural areas and jaiddle-clast m^^%J^,Jm*f...
...A feature of the election was the heavy blow administered to Communists and fellow-travelers...
...It also appears to have concentrated Labor strength in fewer constituencies, with topheavy Labor majorities, while the Tories are spread more evenly and effectively...
...At that, what support the Communists and pro-Communists had was personal, rather than based upon foreign policy...
...Expelled from the Labor party, he left his own constituency and challenged Mr...
...Both bt these mni 64a «e*n^*n*rtU>' regarded as impregnable...
...The polls undermined Herbert Morrison's shrewd strategy of giving every possible encouragement to the Liberals...
...The weather, while not as bad as it might have been, undoubtedly kept some Labor-minded agricultural workers at home...
...My 0*m.prttttttotfM been that Labor would win 45 per cent of the votes cast, and come out with a majority over all other parties in Parliament like 28 «itt: .So'pr as its proportion of the popular vote was concerned, Labor comfortably exceeded my exnectations...
...Labor's ceaseless plugging of the full-employment issue paid big dividends in the industrial and mining areas...
...For the same reason, the small number of independent MP't who had survived into the 1045 Parliament were eliminated this time...
...Perhaps the most crushing blows were the defeats of Willi* Osllecher in Scotland and D. N.Vritt » London...
...Their long record of industry* and devotion to the interests of their constituents was not enough to prevail against popular resentment of their constant defense of Russian policy, and they suffered humiliating defeats...
...The two Communists, and the five "Labor Independents" (i...
...he> jrwUs^s^4f^ «k»e» 184ft .which were radically different in their boundaries from any which had existed before...
...They#were extremely popular with their constituents, for whom they had performed thousands upon thousands of personal services over a period of many years...
...Relying largely on volunteers...
...Since they sensed no danger thai the Tories would take away what Labor has given, they tended to return to the traditional "Country" party, whose doctrines, moreover, were in accordance with their Individualistic outlook on life...
Vol. 33 • March 1950 • No. 9
