The Press Thursday, March 1, 1923. The Liberal Party's Position.

Press, Volume LIX, Issue 17701, 1 March 1923, Page 6

The Press Thursday, March 1, 1923. The Liberal Party's Position.

A speech delivered by Mr T. M. Wilford at a party gathering in>the Patea electorate. as reported By one of the voices of the diehard wing of the Party, exhibits Mr Wilford as very uncertain about his and his Party's position. His uncertainty showed plainly in some very curious, and to us hardly intelligible, remarks concerning Mr Maesey and his Government, He suggested that somehow or other the present Government is on the vergo of becoming exactly like the Russian Sov- j iet Government, and he declared that the question tho Liberals must ask themselves is "whether those electors " who voted Liberal voted against the "Prime Minister personally or his " Government as a party." We take these observations as signifying only that Mr Wilford does not know where he is, and this is tho conclusion one must draw also from his repetition of the now familiar plea that tho Liberal Party must be maintained as a bulwark against Labour. "I advise tho "people of New Zealand," he said, "to remember that while Liberalism " is a power in the land the party led « by Mr Holland can never hope to be "the next Government." Mr Wilford, like most Liberals, speaks with a notable lack of clearness aud precision. By the phrase "while Liberalism remains "a power in the land," liOydoes* not mean "while sound Liberal principles " are supported by a majority of the "population." He means, "while the " Liberal-Labour Party can hold 20 "seats or so in Parliament"—a very different thing. And he lis quite mistaken in supposing that the maintenance of the. Liberal-X/abour Party ae a separate party will operate against the designs of Mr Holland. In so far as the "diehardsj" by keeping up the machinery of the old Liberal- Parly, detach from the Government tho support of moderate men, they divide the anti-revolutionary forces iu tho community, and this is obviously all to the advantage of the revolutionaries. For the present nothing pleases the Reds better than .the diehards' attitude. Mr Wilford told his Waverley audience that i as Mr Holland expressed a wish for a fusion or concordat between Liberals and Reformers, the best thing for p. Liberal to do was to take the course opposite to that desired (or apparently deaited) i*y Mr Holland. It has not pccurred' to him that Mr Holland, who is far more astute than Mr Wilford, would expect this deduction to be drawn, and that ho would so speak as to lead the Liberals to imagine themselves clever in maintaining their separate party. - But the most interesting part of Mr "Gilford's speech was the following paragraph: ~ s , "What the country needs .to-day is an Administration in which the majority of people have Confidence. The man jorlty of people haVe no confidence, in the present Administration, as the eleotionß showed. - Does this spell-* prosperity,;or even tranquillity ? I .think not. How can an Administration bo obtained in which the majority of people have confidence P That is ' the question ,of tho hour 1 , and I shall not be backward in' helping to obtain 6uchj an Adminis-, tratjon if it can be evolved."

Thisrwill be read by some as an. indication that Mr Wilford is after-all leady to Consider some kind of arrangement which will Bring stability. Perhaps that is what it does mean., But the 1 question whtth he describes as "the "question of the hour" is the very question, 'almost even to the words, which "The Press" has a dozen times shown to b© the. question which Mr Wilford's tactics have placed upon himself st special dbligation to answer. So far the only answer he has given has been this: that an Administration agreeable to the country can be ob-: tained only by turning the Government out and placing him in charge tinder the orders of the Beds. The concluding sentence of the passage we have quoted suggests that Mr "Wilford realises that a Liberal-Bed : combination simply will toot do.- TGe 'question of " the hour" is still one which he is obliged to answer; and now that he has admitted that the question is urgent, perhags he will tell the public what his answer is tq be. Will he, or will he not, continue ready to seek the embarrassment, and, if possible, the, overthrow 3 of the Government, with the aid of the Beds?