The Press Monday, July 15, 1929. The Mayor and "The Press."

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19671, 15 July 1929, Page 8

The Press Monday, July 15, 1929. The Mayor and "The Press."

We print this morning a distinctly interesting contribution to the Square controversy by the Mayor, with some pleasant remarks about ourselves. Mr Archer begins with a complaint that it was either "unfair" or "improper" —we are not sure which, but it may have been both—to "suggest that Cr. Sullivan "and himself manoeuvred the visit of "Mr Mawson and knew beforehand "what he was likely to say." We did not, as a matter of fact, "suggest" anything of the kind. We said it quite plainly; and we say quite plainly now that most people will be as surprised as we are ourselves to know that such a suggestion, if we had made it, would have been "absolutely " contrary to fact in every particular." We spoke plainly because Mr Mawson himself spoke plainly—if words mean anything. We shall quote again his opening remarks: — It would be idle for him to say that he was not familiar with all the points of the controversy or all details of the scheme put before him. He had had copies of Thb Press, which had fully explained the whole question, and he had met Cr. D. G. Sullivan in Wellington and told him his point of view. It would be impossible for anyone visiting Christchurch to escape coming into contact with some form of this question, and it would be equally impossible for him to come without forming some opinion of his own as to the best solution of the problem. For a very good reason he declined to be drawn into the discussion on the details or merits of the schemes, and he did not intend to change his attitude. It is Mr Mawson's own fault, and the fault of the Mayor, who introduced him, if this did not mean, first that Mr Mawson had fully acquainted himself with the position in Christchurch and come to certain conclusions on it, and in the second place that he had communicated those conclusions to Cr. Sullivan. We of course accept the statement made by Mr Archer now that until Mr Mawson had actually delivered his address "he [Mr "Archer] had not the slightest idea "what his opinions on the subject " were." We also take back the praise we offered him on Saturday, and which he now tells us he had not earned, for his astuteness in getting Mr Mawson to speak, though we are of course surprised that he should on this occasion have been so much slower than he usually is to take advantage of an obvious opportunity. Unfortunately the Mayor is not content merely to let the public know —through our very "unfair" and "improper" and "disgusting" columns —that he is not so clever as we thought he was. He goes on to say, being a model of fairness and propriety and delicacy, that we insulted Mr Mawson by suggesting that "his [Mr Mawson's] " opinion was moulded by any of us " [Mr Archer and Mr Sullivan, and, "we suppose, their friends]". It would be an insult to Mr Mawson to suggest that he took his opinions on town planning from Mr Archer or Mr Sullivan, and if we had said anything that came within half a mile of a suggestion of that kind we should find it difficult now to offer a sufficiently abject apology. We of course suggested nothing of the kind, and thought nothing of the kind, nor would a single one of our readers think it. We said, and said only, that Mr Mawson on his own confession had told Cr. Sullivan "his point of view." There remains Mr Archer's complaint of our "disgusting habit of call"ing Cathedral Square Lavatory "Square." He himself, he tells us naively, has always referred to the Square as Cathedral Square, even going out of his way to give it a name that was not given to it by the original settlers. Well, it is very unfortunate for Mr Archer that the public "throughout the length and breadth "of the Dominion" have been less impressed by the delicacy of his language than by the indelicacy of his proposed deeds. We like lavatories in our columns as little as we like them in the Square, but Mr Archer knows how to get them out of our columns.