Evening star., 1950-02-05
Churchill, Morrison
Fire 0raforieaI Guns
AT MiddIe-CIass Vote
BY the Associated Press

LONDON, Feb. 4.-Laborites
and Conservatives fired their big
gest oratorical guns today in a
booming battle for the support of
100000 middle-class voters in
the British election February %.
Speaking at Leeds, northern in
dustrial labor, stronghold, Winston
Churchill accused the Labor gov
ernment of deliberately maintain
ing wartime rationing and controls
to get "everybody's life into the
Socialist clutches"
A few hours later Deputy Prime
Minister Herbert Morrison, the
Labor Party's chief strategist, used
the same city as the platform for
broadcast in which he declared
the Conservatives are longing for
q system of boom or bust"
They call it free enterprise,
but you know what it means-once
again it would be feverish prosper
ity for the privileged. followed by
mass unemployment" he said.
Inevitably they would make a
mess of things"
Betting Odds Shift.
With the campaign officially
only in its second day. betting
odds shifted slightly. British
bookmakers offered IL to 8 against
a Conservative Party victory, COM
pared with 5 to 4 few days ago.
The Labor Party was a 4 to 7
favorite, shortening of the odds
of 4 to 6 of week ago. The sec
ond figure in each case represents
the amount one would wager and
the first represent what he would
win if his party came through.
With both parties knowing they
can rely on a more or less evenly
divided hard core of hackers, the
campaigners' guns were trained
mainly on the 100000 floating"
voters, chiefly of the middle class,
who might throw the election
either way.
Both Mr.. Churchill and Mr..
Morrison scornfully attacked the
Liberals, the third most imror-
tant party. Mr.. Morrison said
the most the Liberals could ac-
complish by carrying out their
announced intention sof running
400 candidates for the 625 seats
in Parliament would be to hold
the balance of power between the
two big parties. Ii i
Mr.. Churchill, himself a Liberal
minister years ago. said "in nearly
every case, votes cast for these
candidates will be thrown away"
and would have no part in de-
Gliding the tremendous issues" of
whether Britain keeps Socialism.
The Liberal tonight came out
with their official campaign plat
form. Offering their party as more
likely to unite the nation than
either Conservatives or Socialists. 4"
The platform proposed thrift
and economy, reduction of gov
ernment stats, abolishing or merg-
ing OF 10 government departments,
a reduction in food susidies. and
taking the government out of
business" .s.z.,
Whispering Campaign Hit.
Lord Woolton. Conservative
Party chairman, tonight attacked
the Laborites for what he said
was a e"whispering campaign of
extraordinary malice" that if Mr..
Churchill is returned to power
there will be war. ~
In his Leeds address, Mr..
Churchill told a crowd of 1000 at
the town hall that wartime gov
eminent controls were considered
an evil everywhere except in
Scandinavia, behind the Iron Cur
tain, and in the British Labor gov
ernment.
In Soviet Russia and it's satel-
lite states the withdrawal of the
ration book is the most normel
and most lenient method of en-
forcing direction OF labor or poll
tical discipline" he said.
by this mechanism, British
Socialists hope to get everyone into
their power and make them stand
in queues for the favors which an
all-wide and all-powerful govern
ing machine chooses to bestow."
The United States, he said,
led the way in 1916 and by a
s.most daring decision" cast off
wartime controls. rationing and
..ncyf,Jo& o&;ore of Ill ivi-l.u