TO BUILD.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 299, 18 December 1935, Page 10

TO BUILD.

LABOUR'S SCHEME.

"GREAT TRANSFORMATION."

HOW PEOPLE CAN HELP.

"A great political transformation lias already been accomplished," declared Mr. Savage, "but a great economic and social transformation remains to be accomplished. It is going to be done. I say that with the friendliest feeling in the world. There is no reason 011 earth why anyone should be hurt in the process. When we start to break things, we won't be helping anyone. Our job is to build, not to destroy. The day of the destroyer has gone, and the day of the .builder is here. Building is 1101 always done in Parliament. For the most part it is done outside. It is done by you. Our job is to make it possible for you to carry on with the structure. We can do that with your encouragement and good will. We cannot do without your assistance.

"You are tlie men and women who ' have to do the work, ami I say again tlie great transformation that is neces--1 sary is in your hands. There is no power 011 earth that can stand between you and liberty. You have the right to govern in New Zealand. There is 110 lknit —at least, I cannot see any. We have one of the most fertile countries 011 ! earth. We have a liberty-loving people. There is nothing between you and a standard of life if you can combine to produce. Up to now you have been able to produce, but you have not been able to get access to it. It may be that we will get into disfavour with some When we begin to give you access to the means of life, but ono cannot lieln that. We : are not going to hurt them in the process. It is going to be a peaceful transformation. "No Cause to Worry." "When Labour fails to do your .bidding, when we fail to remove the barriers there have been between you and liberty, it will be your privilege to remove us. But it is my privilege tonight in the name of the new Government to again reassure you that you have 110 cause to worry. We are going to do our share all right. Some of us have spent the greater part of our lives looking at distress and poverty amid plenty. There is 110 reason why that should continue one day further. You have never known what political liberty has meant in the past. The time has come when you should understand what it moans and set out with the utmost good will towards each other in order to "accomplish it." "The purpose- of a nation will decide its destiny" were the words of a great American, said Mr. Savage. What was tho purpose of this nation? It was to remove the barriers that stood between them and liberty. Liberty meant more than to be able to get up in an open place or public liall to address one's fellow citizens. Liberty meant the right to earn one's living and to be able to get access to it without any force. Those were ideals. They meant a definite programme, they meant something worth living for. They saw in their midst little children and they thought of tlie nation that was to be, Surely they could not forget tlieir responsibility. "We have a. tremendous responsibility," continued the Prime Minister, "and if we can only live a life along the lines I am speaking and go down to tlie grave with the knowledge that we have left this world better than we found it, we will have 110 cause to worry. I thank you from the bottom of my heart, not only for the privilege of meeting you here to-night, but for the privilege that I have enjoyed at your hands over long years. I have met you on the liigiwrttys and tlie byways, and I did not need any protection either. I had the protection of the people, and I believe I will have that same protection to-day. When I am unable to meet you on the highways and the byways, I want to get down and make way for somebody else. "This is the greatest moment of my life—to be able to meet my fellow Auckland citizens after the struggles of tho last 28 or 30 years, and to bo able to see the progress we have made'in that comparatively short time," said Mr. Savage. i.X stood in this city, without friends, without money. But the schoolmaster lias been abroad. Tho minds of tho people have been moulded as the years havo gone by. It lias taken some of.us a lifetime to develop the thoughts that are in us now. Some of us liave had our education in the bowels of the earth, in industry, and in other jilaces, and our minds are moulded perhaps in a different way from others. The world is moving 'while men and women sleep. Machine Must Be Servant. The inventor is producing the machine and the scientific process is thrusting human labour into the stream. The work ahead of us is to see that the machine is the servant of mankind. After all, I do not know that this is a. question, of politics. It is just a matter of plain, common sense. The machine is there doing the job. We can have more production if we need it. It is a problem now of making the product of labour go to tlie labourers. The thing seems so plain to me that I sometimes wonder why it takes so many others, so many speakers, to lay the tiling barer than it is now.

"The machine is there taking the place of mankind, multiplying wealth as. the years go by, and as wealth is multiplied, the people "are poorer. What a contradiction! The problem in front of the Government of New Zealand is not only to be able to make it possible for the people to be able to produce the necessities of life but also for them to be able to enjoy those necessities. In concluding his speech, the Prime Minister, said it would bo his privilege, his duty to live up to expectations. It might be that he would make mistakes from time to time. The probability would be that the public would help him to make some, but ho would make other things as well. He hoped he'could 'feel that they trusted each other.

"I value my word as a man just as much as I value my word as Prime Minister—highly," said Mr. Savage. "I appreciate the great honour that has been bestowed upon me by the people of New Zealand, but I can never afford to treat lightly my word as a man. I want to be able to meet you in the days to come and to be able to meet you as friends, to be able to meet you as comrades in a common cause. If we can only live to be that, there is no power 011 earth that can stand between us and liberty."