So far as it could be determined at a late hour last night, the state of the parties in the new House will be as follows:
Reform 55
Labour 13
National 9
Independent 2
Liberal 1
Long before 7 o’clock people commenced to assemble in front of the Daily Times Office where progress reports were announced on the hoardings and from a screen. Within an hour there was a densely packed throng extending to the Queens Gardens and well up Dowling street. It was the largest crowd that had ever collected in front of the Daily Times Office and viewed from the hustings the sea of upturned faces presented a remarkable spectacle. Telegraph wires all over the country were buzzing and results were pouring into the office in a continual stream and were as quickly announced outside, where they were received with groans or cheers, according to the sympathies of the crowd. It was a good-humoured crowd, and a sergeant of police thankfully remarked on this. The Labour element was strongly represented last night, and one enthusiastic "digger" was equipped with a bugle from which a discordant blast would occasionally issue. Other noise making devices were also used, sometimes with deafening effect, and now and again there would be a desultory outburst of cheering. For entertainment purposes, in between whiles, gramophone selections were broadcasted.
A landslide
The country is to be congratulated on the result of the general election yesterday. The electors have decided that their new Prime Minister is a man who fully merits their confidence. They have placed him at the head of a party so large as to relieve him of the slightest anxiety as to the possibility of his giving effect to the programme which he has placed before the Dominion. It is indeed a party that is almost embarrassingly large. Mr Coates would no doubt have been contented with a party of smaller dimensions, and it might even have been in the interests of the State if the opposition with which the Government will be confronted in the new Parliament were more efficient than it is likely to be. Mr Coates has clearly impressed the public with a sense of his activity and virility and, what is more important still, with a sense of his earnestness.
A remarkable feature of the election is that not a single member of the Reform Party who offered himself for re-election has lost his seat, while the new members of the party are more numerous than the total strength of either the National or the Labour Party. That illustrates rather forcibly the character of the "land-slide" in favour of the Government.
The Labour Party will now be the official Opposition, and Mr Holland and his supporters will doubtless derive a good deal of satisfaction from that fact, so much indeed as perhaps to temper very appreciably the disappointment they will feel in the diminution of their parliamentary strength. — editorial — ODT, 5.11.1925
Compiled by Peter Dowden
