Labour's Municipal Campaign

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23316, 30 April 1941, Page 6

Labour's Municipal Campaign

The policy which the Labour Party offers to the municipal electors of Christchurch, as it was outlined .last week by the mayoral candidate, Mr E. Parlane, is intended to have a practical, moderate appearance. Of about 10 programme points listed, it is easy to name six which any party would endorse. It is not Labour policy, it is non-party or all-party policy, to' carry on the street surfacing programme, to develop.the water supply adequately, to encourage the, sale of household electrical equipment, to improve and extend parking facilities in the city; and to move towards the planned amalgamation of local bodies in the Christchurch area. The real question is whether the Labour Party is more to be trusted than any possible alternative group to pursue such policy aims with energy and with prudence. There is very little to suggest it. If the Labour Party holds wide, constructive views on local government, for example, and has plans to correspond and the will to work on them, the amalgamation of New Brighton with Christchurch is poor evidence of it. There is, in fact, not the slightest reason to believe that the Labour Party has approached the problem of regional administration with the intelligence and the determination to solve it. As for better parking facilities, he must be a very simple elector who does not feel that he had rather be shown what the Labour Party had done or hear ‘exactly what it proposes than be asked to pay for a vague promise with a straight-out vote. These two tests are sufficient to apply before saying that the Labour Party’s sixth non-party claim on the electors is set up in a pledge to “ co-operate with the Government in ’’the prosecution of the war and to give ail “ assistance to bring it to a. successful con- ” elusion.” There the Labour Party’s right to the electors 5 support is well enough tested by the facts reported yesterday, which show that Christchurch, after 20.months of war, has an emergency precautions scheme—on paper. In tone more respect, probably, the Labour Party’s policy is every party’s policy, subject to a reservation the Labour Party is not likely to make. The Labour .Party will “continue to “ take advantage of the Government’s offer of ” cheap'money for: housing, particularly for the aged, and infirm,” A party with no prejudice in favour of State and local body spending, .as

such, or State and local body enterprises, as such, 'would promise to keep housing needs and supply under constant survey and to develop a municipal programme only as a necessary alternative or supplement to normal construction. For the rest, Mr Parlane announced that the Labour Party would “ co-operate with the “ Government in the provision of useful work “at standard rates of pay” and that it would “ take a vote of electors within the city for the “provision of a municipal" milk scheme.” In two sentences Mr Parlane exposed two of his party’s weaknesses. It is not thinking of the interests of the community whose affairs it wants to administer. If it were, it would say that it intends to take a strict account of the results and the costs of the projects in which the Christchurch City Council has already cooperated and will limit its future policy accordingly. But what the municipal Labour Party is thinking of, as Mrs Parlane very candidly said, is its place and function as “part “ and parcel of the Labour Party proper, of the “party sitting on the Government benches in “Wellington.” Second, the elector who likes to work things out will wonder why the Labour Party, with its passion for municipalisation, does not frankly—as with excellent reason it might—stand for a municipalised milk supply, and why it offers softly to take a poll instead. He will not have much trouble. The Labour Party is afraid of losing a few votes if it boldly advocates a policy which it knows to be essential but which has, as the party knows also, stirred some stubborn and prejudiced opposition. The Labour Party, iri Christchurch municipal affairs, shows' the electors a pretence of practical zeal for municipal progress. The realities are that its service is pledged, not to the municipality, but to a “ party sitting on “ the Government benches in Wellington,’,’ and that it is ready to sing small if it can save a vote. The mixture of sham, servility, and cowardice is not attractive.