The Press SATURDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1942. No-Confidence Debate

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23771, 17 October 1942, Page 4

The Press SATURDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1942. No-Confidence Debate

With the support of Mr Coates, Mr Hamilton, Mr Kyle, Mr J. N. Massey, and Mr Wilkinson, the Government’s majority against Mr Holland’s no-tonfidence motion was lifted to 47 votes to 17. Nevertheless, the Government’s defence, on the issues defined by Mr Holland, was. a melancholy one. The issues were three: the handling of the strike, the use of the censorship, and the control of war finance. On the first, Mr Holland’s case is of the clearest. After considerable delay, the Government decided on a course of action against the 180 Pukemiro strikers, and statements by the Minister of Mines and the Acting Prime Minister indicated beyond any possibility of doubt that the Government intended to stand by this decision, whatever the consequences. Thus the attitude taken up by Mr Holland, as deputy-chairman of the War Cabinet, was fully sustained. But in the result (a) the sentences imposed by the Court were first suspended and then remitted, and (b) the Government permitted itself to adopt a condition, which, whether the Government had previously discussed State control or not, was certainly put forward by the strikers and has not yet been explained by the Government in any way that distinguishes it from a concession made to end the strike. This was retreat and surrender. Events plainly suggest it; the substance and tone of Mr Sullivan’s, Mr Webb’s, and Mr Semple’s statements prove it; and the glaringly bad match between them and Mr Fraser’s account of the Government’s triumphant policy of tact and discretion adds proof to proof. This is not to say ‘that the Government’s first and unmistakable policy of prosecuting 180 miners and upholding the law at all costs was wise. If there were “ precedents ” to lean on in retreat, there were precedents, also, to warn the Government against words too big and deeds too embarrassing. Mr Holland has said that he' advised instant action against “ the ringleaders why not? But if the question of alternative action cannot be argued to any sure conclusion, the Ministers who now insist that the law could not have been pressed against the strikers without disaster are certainly betraying their own case, and in two ways. The Hon. H. T. Armstrong declared that imprisoning the ringleaders, as Mr Holland proposed, “would not have got the “ miners back to work.”. In other words, the strike would have continued. Had the 180 miners sentenced actually been imprisoned, said Mr Fraser, “ it would not have '• stopped at that. Another 800 or “ 1000 miners would have faced the “ same charge.” In other words, the strike would have continued. Now these statements mean two things: first, that the Government’s original decision, to prosecute and abide the consequences, was an error from which it had to retreat, for fear of the consequences; and second, that the Government confesses its own want of authority over the miners, and its inability to control them by applying a law of its own making. This is damning confession; and a majority of 47 to 17 does not cover the exposure. On the second issue, of the use of the censorship, we have something to say in another article. Here it is necessary to add only that the Prime Minister’s retort against .Mr Holland’s protest—“ Why did Mr “Holland have a complaint? Did “he wish to stab the Government “ with which he was co-operating in “ the back?”—was unfair. If, as Mr Fraser acknowledged, Mr Holland had tackled the question of war expenditure “ earnestly and success- “ fally,” he had ground enough to complain when the censorship denied him the opportunity to inform the country upon his work and its results—ground clear and strong enough to protect him against the Prime Minister’s suggestion that he had, or needed, any other. And if the Prime Minister’s reason for suggesting it is that Mr Holland's statement embodied some critical reflections on measures and methods previously approved, or tolerated, or ignored, it is an inadequate reason. The need for fuller information on war finance far outweighs the motive to disallow it because an account of faults corrected implies criticism of faults committed. Mr Fraser appears to be afraid to allow colleagues a freedom so fully granted by Mr Churchill to his that they have been able to express doubts of the British Government’s policy, and even to dissent from it. They have not been charged with base motives. As for the financial issue as such, Mr Holland has been content to say that he found certain practices open to objection, and stopped them, and that the need for detailed scrutiny of proposals had appeared to him to require the appointment of two committees of review. Mr Fraser’s answer that “ ordinary methods ” are impossible in war, and that the “ War Cabinet “took steps to control expenditure “ and secure full details,” is no answer at all. The question is whether Mr Holland had found both the need and the way to improve the extraordinary methods adopted, and had taken more effective steps than the War Cabinet had taken previously. If Mr Holland did—and Mr Fraser was careful not to deny it—then it was in the Prime Minister’s most ungenerous and unfair mood, again, that he sneered at Mr Holland for having served, “not as “ a representative of the people of “ the Dominion but as a representa- “ live of certain class interests.”