Page:British hansard (1963) Malaysia bill.djvu/13

 To that broad statement I add that in Malaya itself the opposition parties are opposed to Malaysia, and at the last election, the opposition parties polled 49 per cent. of the total votes. In Singapore there has been the referendum about which my right hon. Friend the Member for Smethwick spoke. I take the view that it was a cumbersome referendum and not clear. The very fact that in those circumstances 30 per cent. of the voters returned blank papers indicates that in Singapore as well there is at least a strong minority against federation.

The position in Sarawak as a result of the election is very uncertain. I want to correct a statement which I have made when I said that there was to be a coalition Government of the United People's Party and the Negara Party which was asking for a plebiscite. As I understand it, those two parties have agreed to form a joint front, but they will not necessarily be the government. The position is uncertain. The majority of elected members support Malaysia, but it is quite possible that with the defection of the Negara Party from the Alliance, and with the Independents, whose views are not clear, there may be a majority in favour of a plebiscite taking place through the United Nations before Malaysia is introduced.

I am sorry to say this, but I gathered the very strong opinion that the influence of British officials during the election was quite partially exerted against the United People's Party. I will not go into it" in any detail now, but I have documents and even a poster which was displayed during the election on British authority and which said—"Do not split the vote".

Mr. A. G. Bottomley (Middlesbrough, East) I am sure that my hon. Friend does not want to mislead. The documents he is about to show were put up long before the elections came about. Quite rightly, he made representations at the time that they ought not to be up when the election took place.

Mr. Brockway I was about to add that, and I would hope that my right hon. Friend would have known that I try to be fair.

Mr. Bottomley Always.

Mr. Brockway With my right hon. Friend, I went to a leading British official who gave us an undertaking that these posters would be withdrawn. I have subsequently had a letter from him saying that the posters had been put up much earlier and that in those circumstances they would not be withdrawn.

I will not enter into that in further detail now, but the attitude revealed by the hon. Lady the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Miss Vickers) of dismissing the United People's Party as a Communist Party leads me to say that there is no British official in the administration in Sarawak who would say that.

Miss Vickers I said that the Panas Party had broken away from the alliance. I did mot mention Communists.

Mr. Brockway I apologise. I misheard. The identification of the United People's Party with Communism is entirely unjustified. If there is any reflection of Communism in it, it is at low branch level. I do not think that any British official would say otherwise.

In North Borneo our impression was that the politically alert favoured Malaysia, but these are the élite. That country is economically underdeveloped. There is not a road which crosses it. It is politically underdeveloped. There cannot be the beginnings of a party having its roots in the people in a territory of that kind. Therefore even in North Borneo I think that there must be some doubts about permanent support for Malaysia.

The next thing that concerns me—and I am sure it will concern the right hon. Gentleman—is the effect of Malaysia on relations with the neighbouring peoples, particularly those of Indonesia and the Philippines. This is an uneasy region, with Indonesia with its 100 million people neutral, and the nearby Philippines pro-West. If there is to be stability in this area, some concord must be found between Malaya, Indonesia, and the Philippines. This is why I share the