WAR DANGER.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 230, 29 September 1938, Page 22

WAR DANGER.

MR. SAVAGE'S VIEW.

SPEECH AT DUNEDIN.

SCOTTISH CITY'S WELCOME.

(By Tt-legrupli —Pro** Association. 1 DUXE DIN". Wed n c*.da y. Something in the nature of a triumphal progress from the railway Mat ion to his hotel whs enjoyed bv the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. M. ,1. Savage, when lie arrived at Duiiedin by express thi* afternoon, accompanied by the Minister of Mines, the Hon. J , . C. Webb. As the train draw in there was a crowd of several hundreds of people on the station and Mr. Savage and Mr. Webb alighted from the Ministerial car to the accompaniment of loud cheers and the strains of "Bluebells of ScotIhikl,' , played by the Korbnry School Band, which, in its kilted uniform, gave the Ministers a characteristic welcome to tho .Scottish city of Xew Zealand.

The Prime Minister and Mr. Webb were welcomed by the. deputy-Mayor, Mr. Cameron, and by members of the civic' committee of the City Council. a« well as iocal members of Parliament and local officials of the Labour movement. Three cheers were given with enthusiasm. Crowd Outside Hotel. After a liberal round of hiind-luikes tho Ministerial ear* moved off behind the band, which led the, procession with a vigorous rendering of the war-time song "Keep the Home Fires Biirriinu." and all the way to the (iiand Hotel a crowd of ardent supporters siirnvuntcd Mr. Savage's car. At the hotel another crowd gathered, nnd n< Mr. Savage an.l Mr. Webb stopped out of fieir car nmid cheers and cries of '(iood old Mick." there wan euch .a press n» almost to prevent them from reaching' the doors. '"I thank you sincerely fur the reception Jon have given me,' , en id Mr. Savage, pausing on the .steps, "and 1 want to assure you again, if the assurance is nece««ary, that you have not backed the wrong horse." Air. Savage and Mr. Webb were the gueat» of honour at a Labour party nocial, presided over by the chairman of the Otupo Labour representation committee, Mr. P. G. Connolly. The Ministers were given an enthusiastic reception.

World Happenings. "The world is moving all right," Mr. Savage said, "but we have still a long way to go before we reach sanity. All you have,to do is to read the current cable news to see how slender a hold of civilisation we have. It look* as though we are ready to go-back to the jungle any time. 1 remember speaking at the Fountain in Dunedin in 1911, and a great deal of water has flowed under the bridge between that time and ihe time when I as Labour Prime Minister of New Zealand, represented tnia Dominion at the Coronation of our King and Queen.

"When I was at the Coronation no one talked about war, and the representative* of various nations seemed to be impressing one another. But how ■hallow it must have been. I said then that unlets we were at peace in the industrial world we could never be properly at peace, and it seemed, to me that if we could get representatives of the various nations round the table we could see what wae wrong. If we had started then to get the nations together and talk to them quite frankly we could have seen what they thought was wrong and tried to straighten it out.

"Something Wioag." "I do not think anyone wants trouble," Mr. Savage said, "but there seems to be something fundamentally wrong. It seems to me that we will never solve it except by discussion round the table. Nevertheless, we have made tome progress in Xew Zealand, because when I used to speak with other members of the Lajxjur movement in various parts of Xew Zealand I never thought I would be visiting Dunedin as Prime Minister." "Wherever w» go we find that oldtime battlers In the Labour movement are thrilled with the work that the first Labour Government in New Zealand ■an accomplished," said Mr. Webb in replying to the toast in his honour. "Nevertheless, we would sooner be defeated and retain the goodfellowship of our friends in the movement than sacrifice that goodwill and remain in office." Mr. Webb said the business men of New Zealand had never enjoyed real prosperity until the bulk of the people bad Money to buy the things they needed. The extra £33,000,000 in the national wages bill had done great things for' the business community as well at bringing about the annihilation of the unemployment problem as it was known three years ago. This year the Government had managed to organise work for every man who could do a job. and that had never been done in this country before.