MR W. J. POLSON ASSAILED

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21404, 21 February 1935, Page 14

MR W. J. POLSON ASSAILED

ATTACK BY FORMER MINISTER EXCHANGES IN THE HOUSE [From Our Parliamentary Reporter.] WELLINGTON, February 20. An accusation that Mr W. J. Poison (C., Stratford) had changed his view on the necessity for the State guaranteeing bonds issued under the rural credits scheme was made by the Hon. W. Downie Stewart in the House tonight, when discussing the Mortgage Corporation BUI. Mr Downie Stewart stated that Mr Poison now urged that bonds issued by the corporation should be State-guaranteed, whereas, as a member of the Rural Credits Commission of 1926, he had not considered a State guarantee necessary for rural credit bonds. . Mr Downie Stewart said that when the commission returned fjom its tour overseas in 1926, only about two weeks of the session remained However, the commission (of which Mr Poison was one of three members) had represented it as urgent that its scheme should be tried out, and the Government agreed to put through a short bill before the House rose. Mr Poison: You do not suggest that that bill represented the views of the commission? T Mr Downie Stewart: Certainly I do. You were present and you signed the report, and ever since then you have been trying to fox on it. I notice also that you have been criticising myself and others in private meetings of farmers, instead of in this House, where we can reply. Returning to the attack later, Mr Downie Stewart said he was surprised when Mr Poison said at a recent Farmers' Union meeting, "that he had had bitter experience of disavowal by the State of its liabilities under the rural credits bond scheme m the days of Downie Stewart." Mr Poison had alleged that Mr Downie Stewart had acted under the dictation of financial interests, so that others could make larger profits, and Mr Poison was the very man who had said that the bonds should not be State guaranteed. On that advice, the Government in 1926 had acted. . Mr Poison: That is a sheer misstatement of fact. Rising later to claim that he haa been misrepresented, Mr Poison said it was impossible to reply at that stage to all the misrepresentations; but one statement called for immediate reply. In his highly-imaginative story. Mr Downie Stewart said that the speaker had discredited these bonds issued with rural advances. Mr Poison said the commission had recommended that the State should issue bonds, and that they should be, in effect, State bonds. He had objected to the Government repudiating responsibility for payment of interest and principal on those bonds. CONTINUATION OE DEBATE PROPOSED MORTGAGE CORPORATION VARYING VIEWS ADVANCED [From Our Parliamentary Reporter.] WELLINGTON, February 20. The debate on the Mortgage Corporation of New Zealand Bill was continued in the House of Representatives to-day. Continuing his speech of last night, Mr W. A. Bodkin (C., Central Otago) criticised tne suggestion made by the leader of the Opposition that prices for produce should be guaranteed. He contended that indirectly this would have the effect of raising the exchange by 100 to 150 per cent. Mr Bodkin aiso spoke disparagingly of the Labour party's plans for an issue of paper money, and maintained that the inflationary policy to which the party was pledged was a direct attack on the savings of the people, as represented in savings bank deposits and superannuation funds. When Mr Bodkin referred to the propaganda value at election time of promises to provide cheap money, he was sharply reminded of a £70,000,000 of which the United party had spoken. "I freely admit that that £70,000,000 was a big factor in putting the United party into power," he said. "I have no regrets about that, no matter what hard things have been said about it. (Laughter.) The opinion that a fixed dividend of 4 per cent, was preferable to a fluctuating dividend of 1 per cent, above the bond rate, as proposed in the bill, was expressed by Mr C. H. Clinkard (C., Rotorua). Mr Clinkard also considered that there should be a directorate of seven, with two representatives of the shareholders, instead of eight as intended. Mr Clinkard opposed the appointment of joint managers. Dual Management Criticised "Dual management will not be successful," he said. "One man should be in control. In my opinion, the Minister for Finance would have been wiser to follow the course he adopted in the case of the Reserve Bank and appoint one man as supreme authority, with a deputy to take charge during his absence." "Half-pie Communism" was the description applied to the Governments proposals by Mr Clyde Carr (Lab., Timaru). He declared that the bill was a betrayal of the democratic principle, in that it surrendered the State's responsibility as custodian of the equal rights of all people. State institutions, long established for the service of the general community, were to be absorbed by a semi-private profitmaking corporation. "This legislation," said Mr Carr, "has been designed to create the impres- | sion that something remedial is being done. The public is being deliberately misled. The Minister for Finance is unleashing the financial dogs of war, who want the whole of our State enterprises handed over to outside interests, whose proposal in the bill is to borrow our way out of debt. So far, from serving the interests of the farmer. these proposals will only serve still further to exploit the farmer for the benefit of the high priests of finance." Views of Mr Veitch Mr W. A. Veitch (Ind., Wanganuii said the bill went too far. It was not right that a scheme which practically reconstituted the whole mortgage system of the Dominion and cut deeply into established practices should be introduced within a few months of a general election. Such a vast and important change as that proposed should be submitted to the people before being finally adopted by Parliament The redeeming feature of the bill was that it was practically the lsst stage of the Government's "great reconstruction scheme." If the farmer was losing heart after four years of a plan specially devised for his advantage, what must be the plight of his victims? Mr Coates: What victims? Mr Veitch: The workers, the professional peoDle, all sectioi.s of the community. Tbe method by which we propose to meet the farmers' troubles is to be carried out at the expense of every prudent man and woman in New Zealand. It is proposed to keep on the land all who now ocr-uny it. the incompetent farmer ps well as th? competent farm°r —the land monopolist, as well as the legitimate farmer.