LABOUR POLICY

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 85, 10 April 1943, Page 4

LABOUR POLICY

To The Editor One pleasing feature of Mr. Neary's letter is that he does not dispute the fact that the national executive would try to prevent the rank and file from nominating candidates against the sitting members. He says that he does know that disloyal members who have stood against the selected candidate have committed political suicide. This may be so when selfish and personal interests are involved, but not when it is a question of policy and principles, especially when one is endeavouring to keep our legislators from following in the footsteps of their predecessors. One remembers the days when the majority of the members of the Labour Government were perambulating the country telling their audiences that they were socialists, who believed in the socialisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange. This was and still is the main plank in their platform. What has happened to this main plank. The Labour Conference has not deleted it; has it been attacked by termite and become so rotten that it had to be thrown overboard so as to prevent other planks from becoming infested, or was it thrown overboard too late? These are vital questions the workers of this Dominion have to ask not only themselves, but the politicians also. Mr. Neary says that the Labour movement consented to" conscription— conscription of what? Surely not girls 18 and 19 years of age. No Government should make regulations of a like nature by Order-in-Council methods; this question should have first of all been discussed from the floor of the House. As for not allowing prices to rise as they did in the war period of 1914-18, ask any housewife—she knows the answer only too well. JACK WILLIAMS.