The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. TUESDAY, AUGUST 30, 1921. NEW ZEALAND POLITICS.

Auckland Star, Volume LII, Issue 206, 30 August 1921, Page 4

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 30, 1921. NEW ZEALAND POLITICS.

For the cause that lacks α-mstanee, For the wrong that need* resittanee, For the future in the diatance, And the good that toe ottrt do.

In the pool of New Zealand politics the | disturbance caused by the arrival of Mr. Statham's new party has been that of a Wall pebble. For the leader of the National Progressive and Moderate Labour party (which, if only for the sake of busy journalists, we are glad to hear is to be called "New" for short) no one who knows him .lias anything but respect. Mr. Statham is a member of more than nverage ability and an outstanding figure for earnestness and political honesty. We can fully sympathise with him in the troubled position in which he found .himself. His own party he judged to be weighed in the balance and found wanting, and he abhorred the arid class consciousness and anti-patriotic bias of the leaders of the Labour party, while Parliamentary Liberalism, weakened and fissured, apparently had no attraction. In his disgust at the misgovernment of the country—we should doubt whether at any previous period New Zealand was so badly governed as during the last two years—and his earnest desire for improvement, he decided to form a newparty, which was intended to capture the moderate working man, and, indeed, the moderate in all classes, and apparently to come into the Liberal inheritance. So far apparently only one or two members of Parliament have joined his banner, but he counters this by saying it is intended to build up the party outside Parliament. From what we have observed, however, we should say snecess so far was but small. The point about Mr. Statham's views and programme that will strike most people is inconsistency. In the interview we. published on Saturday he uttered some very sound criticism of the Government's finance, including remarks on the "crushing" taxation of industries and the growth of public services. But he himself through his programme is in favour of greatly increased expenditure. He wants complete free education, including free school books and free meals for children; and also free I medical attention for the poor, free maternity homes, and pensions for everybody at sixty. About one-third of the proposals in the party programme are for free something or other. If Mr. Statham were a less earnest public man we should be tempted to think that most of this part of the programme was mere window-dressing to catch the customer. Hβ ought to realise, however, that at present, at any rate, and probably for an indefinite period, the country will be ehnt off from the realisation of such aims by an unscalable wall of money scarcity, to say nothing of other considerations. The question is going to be not what fresh enterprises can the Government put its hands upon, but whether it can afford to do as much as it is doing at present. For the rest, the programme is mainly vague. It includes an elective executive, which is still as far from realisation as ever it was, and reform of the Upper House, which the Reform party took up and laid on the shelf. An "efficient railway and roads policy" is one of these generalities which a new party ought to avoid; it means nothing. "Efficiency" has become a tiresome catchword, and it is time that those who use it to conceal their mental haziness were asked what it means and how they propose to obtain it. We notice that the new party steers clear of electoral reform, one of the great questions of the day. No, we must say the programme and the expositions of it put forward are not impressive. They do not come to grips with most of the stern realities of the economic and political situation to-day. They have the feel of cottonwool, not eteel. As he goes about the country expounding this new evangel Mr. Statham may do some good in arousing interest in politics and compelling people to study the weaknesses and sins of the Government. He is quite justified in saying that Mr. Massey practically rules this country, and that Parliament is in need of reform. The main reason, however, why Mr. Massey is in this position, why he has so large, so eubeervient, and so unthinking a party behind him, and why Parliament is so neglectful of its duties, is that at the last election the progressive elements of the country were divided and allowed the enemy to defeat them in detail. Mr. Statham proposes to add to these divisions. He is a good diagnostician, but an indifferent prescriber. The "Herald," we observe, says that if he .persists in his intention of contesting 65 seats at the next election he will risk presenting a few seats to the Labour party. He is more likely to present them to or preserve them for the Reform party. The Liberal party is the real Opposition, and its present weaknesses do not alter' the fact. It is in the strengthening of that party, which represents the body of moderate and loyal progressive thought in the country, that ' there lies the hope of building up the j strong Opposition that Parliament needs, I and replacing the Government with something better. It has what no other party possesses, a record of great achievement and a tradition on which further success can be built, and the advantage of appealing to men and women of all classes through the undying attachment to Liberal ideas. I I I