MAYORAL CONTEST

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20223, 29 April 1931, Page 15

MAYORAL CONTEST

LABOUR CANDIDATE. ! MR SULLIVAN OPENS CAMPAIGN. A definite undertaking that if the Labour Party secures a majority on the new City Council, it will reduce the rates was given by Mr D. G. Sullivan, M.P., Labour candidate for the Mayoralty, in opening his campaign in the Choral Hall last evening. Several of Labour's nominees for the Council and other local bodies were also on tho platform . The candidate was greeted by cheers from the audience, which filled the hall in all parts. The Mayor, Mr J. K. Archer, who presided, said the meeting was tho largest in his municipal experience. Details of City administration could be dealt with amicably enough by -the Council, he said, but the standard ,of living ot tho mass of the people was now in danger. A climax had been reached in such a policy in the treatment of the tramway employees. "It is a piece of hooliganism," said the Mayor. "The cut of 22$ per cent, is practically enough, to cause a revolution. 1 am told that it means putting the clock back thirty years for the men. . . . Dan is a man of proved capacity, and he is an optimist. We believe that our present difficulties will be overcome." "Good thoughts" for the candidate were conveyed in a telegram from Mr E. J. Howard, M.P. Mr H. E. Holland, M.P., Leader of the Labour Party, also telegraphed good wishes. Mr Sullivan said his nomination as Mayor had been a unanihious one so far as the Labour Party was concerned. He had noticed that at tho opening meeting of the Citizens' Association quite a lot of notice had been given to- himself by Mr W, Hayward and others. His opponent expressed tho opinion that the rule should be "one man, one job," but he found it hard to credit that the Citizens' Association believed in such a principle. If it did, Mr Hayward would not be his opoponent. Tramway Board and Employees. Mr J. McCombs had stated in Wellington that if it had not been for the representations of Mr Hayward, the Bill which the Christchurch Labour members sought to introduce into Parliament to bring the Tramway Board again under the Arbitration Court would have been placed before tho Legislature. It was only when a Labour man was a candidate that the "one man, one job" principle was enunciated, Wellington was not on the other side of the world, and constant communication with Christchurch could be maintained, by telephone. It was always an advantage for a city or borough to have its Mayor in Parliament. The salary paid to the Mayor was only an allowance to enable him to meet the expenses of the position, and, indeed, was usually inadequate. This should be a sufficient reply to the newspaper correspondence in reference to the probability of his drawing two salaries. Keferring to wage reductions, Mr Sullivan said the reason for the position in which the world saw itself was that the mass of the people had received an insufficient return from industry. The margin between the purchasing power of the wage-earners and the mass of production had grown too wide. Among those who had recognised that the solution of the world's troubles was the payment of high wages were Henry Ford, James Tarrell, and J. M. Keynes. Even those among the big men in the Old World who disagreed with such views did so with doubts and hesitancy. The Conservative leaders of Britain and America who were struggling with tho depression were thinking very hard about the matter.

Seduction in Wages. But the first thing that struck - the political leaders in power in New Zealand as a remedy for the present situation was a reduction in wageß, and the others who did locally what was done nationally by Mr .Forbes and Mr Goates followed the same policy. "The Christchurch Tramway Board has perpetrated one of the most scandalous things in the history of local bodies," said Mr Sullivan. Nearly the first thing the Board had done after the election was to take advantage of 4 technicality in the Act to escape from the Arbitration Court, and filch from the new conditions and rights they ,had worked for and fought for over a long period of years. "You can take these and conditions, or leave them," the Board had said, with the knowledge that the City was full of unemployed. Labour men had protested unceasingly against the gross exploitation of the misfortune of the unemployed, and if Sir Joseph Ward were alive to-day the things that were being done "by the United Government would not be allowed by him. Sir Joseph Ward had been scarcely cold in his grave before Mr Forbes, accepting the dictatorship of Mr Goates, had reduced the wages of relief workers. Married men were now being asked by the Unemployment Board and the City Council to keep a wife and family on an average of 28s per week. The Government could not maintain the prisoners in the gaols on such an outlay. If Labour controlled the new City Council, it would do all in its power to improve the position. Negotiations would be opened with the Unemployment Board, and the Conncil would endeavour to raise sufficient thoney to subsidise the relief wages. Jt should be possible for the people of Ohristchurch to do more to help themselves, and they could do so by refusing to import millions of pounds' worth of clothing and footwear, when they could be made in this country. Under the leadership of the City Council a campaign could be- launched to have these goods made in Chifistchurch. Fostering Local Industry. It might be possible to have all Such goods stamped, "Made in Christchurch," and to inspire in the minds of all the people that every time they bought them they were helping to- provide employment. Some of the money spent on unemployment relief might profitably be used for the afforestation of the City's reserves. After a very close study of the estimates he had come to the conclusion that for an emergency year like the pres ent one and perhaps for next year also, it should be possible to reduce the general rate by approximately ten per cent. While he would not pledge his colleagues to such a figure, Labour would definitely promise, if returned to power, to make a reduction. A still closer study of the estimates might enable an even larger reduction' than ten per cent, to be made. Even labour's opponents had shown that they had • confidence in Labour's administration of the City's finances when theyhad afcked him, on Cr. C. E. Jones's election, to retain tae chairmanship of the, Finance Committee. When Labour went out of office it left" a credit balance of £16,807, whieh the other side used to make a slight reduction in rate?. Just as in the past, while Betving the very best interests of the workers, the Labour Council had also given its close attention to the affairs of the City, tlio new Labour Council would carry on the same policy. If Labour was .defeated Mr Forbes arid Mr Coates would regard

(ACCIDENTS.

SHOOTING TRAGEDY. YOUNG MAN'S DEATH. (PRES3 ASSOCIATION TELEGBAM ) WELLINGTON, April 28. When returning from a day's shooting on the Wainui-o-Mata Hills yesterday afternoon, William Ernest Childs, aged twenty-one, was accidentally shot and died in hospital. t Childs and a friend, H. R- Pochard, left Lower Hutt at eight o'clock in the morning to go shooting in the neighbouring hills, and we^ e returning about 1.30 p.m. Pritchard, who was in'the lead, had just gone through a rence when he heard a shot, and, turning, saw Childs " an 6" ing on the fence. He went back ana spoke to him, but received no reply. He then took the injured man from the feiice, and noticed that a shot from the .22 calibre rifle which Childs had been carrying had entered the corner of the right eye. With the assistance of two passersby Cliilds was conveyed to hospital, but he died shortly after admittance. FATAL JUMP FROM LORRY. (PRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) WELLINGTON, April 28. At the inquest of Charles Frederick Astridge, wlio was killed when a motor lorry, in which he was a passenger, crashed over a bank on Paekakarika Hill, tho Coroner returned a verdict that -he was killed through jumping from the lorry while it was out of control. x The driver, Gay, gave evidence that the lorry got away while going down in gear through the propeller shaft breaking. Astridge jumped, or fell, while the lorry was still on the road. Witness steered into the bank three times in an attempt to stop; and the third time 'the lorry, on returning to the road, went clean across and over. BOY KILLED. (press association telegram.) TAUMARUNUI, April 28. Edward Jeffries, aged fourteen,- was riding home from school on horseback yesterday when he collided with the Taringamotu Sawmill Company's locomotive at a tramline crossing. The boy received injuries which proved fatal twenty minutes later.