RETORT TO MINISTER

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 42, 19 February 1943, Page 4

RETORT TO MINISTER

"MIDDLE OF ROAD PARTY"

WRATHFUL WOMEN WAITING (P.A.) NAPIER, this day. In connection with the statement by the Minister of Marketing, Mr. Barclaj r , at Hikurangi, in which he is reported as having said, "I have no time for the rats Avho went outside the party. I do not believe in the old monetary system, but rather in the middle course which the Government, is now trying to steer in war finance, stabilisation and social security," the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr. Barnard (Democrat Labour), a has made " the following comment: —"If the Minister .feels that his job and seat are in danger, he ought not to get excited about it, especially when there is a body of wrathful women awaiting him on his return to Wellington, concerned not over portfolios, but the price of food. "Mr. Barclay is worried about the political machinery, and more and more people are troubled over the ideals and the policies that are likely to give effect to them. Emerson once advised us to hiteh our wagon to a star. Mr. Barclay seems rather concerned with keeping his waning star hitched to his political wagon. He admits that the Government is now the middle of the road party. I would remind him that it was not this gospel that put Labour into power in 1935 and 1938, nor is it a message for which the people are looking in these portentous times."