THE LABOUR PARTIES.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 292, 7 December 1923, Page 7

THE LABOUR PARTIES.

<To the Editor.) . Sir^—There is much that is amusing in the cablegram of the Labour party of New Zealand, to the Labour party of Great Britain. The political contest is over the question of the continuance of the present .trade policy, of Great Britain, or its reform. Under present conditions there have been for years millions there on the verge of starvation, and now a million arid a half of workers out of employment and living on Starte charity, because Great Britain-has «n open door for trade, and is nraoe the dumping ground'for the overproduction of all protectionist tariff countries. Britain's home markets are invaded. There is no country so industrially slack, so rife with unemployed, as Great Britain, the only free trade ■ country in the world. And Mr. Baldwin says, as a business man. this must be altered if »c would keep our home markets, and find. in that way, employment for our own people. What' does the New Zealand Labour party say? Many of the shirkers and anti-win-the-u a r leaders of Labour-affirm that free trade "must be the gospel for Great Britain. Keep the Mother Country, "by all means, in straitened needs' of "unemployment, it says to the. Arthur .Hendersons and • Ramsay MacDonald.s but do not suggest free trade for New Zealand, to us of the New Zealand Labcmiv..party* .or. this Dominion will' tie made" the dumpingground for the cheap, productions of other countries, and ..thousands' of our trade,unionists .will be-■out. ; of -employment, andY wiH- lose -their- jobs, too, for suggesting-it: 'We Labour i'eaifers were all bbf-ii free traders, too, but j>e have all grown out of ii. Still it's quite <rooil enough for Great Britain, and'-ive are all desirous^-as a,*• Labour.party;.-,that the Mother Country should -continue a policy—if Mr. Arthur Henderson says . sej—that", will continue' to max liei- . progress,, and .. keep- her millions out of employment. •.. This attitude of the Labour leaders, so called, in New' Zea land, woujd fye amusing . were it not that what they advocate is having such ■ tragic issues to many.—l am. etc., .T. D. SIEVYVRIGHT.