National Body Formed To Oppose 1960 Tour

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28999, 14 September 1959, Page 12

National Body Formed To Oppose 1960 Tour

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, Sept. 13. At a conference held in Wellington on Saturday, a national organisation comprising the numerous branches of the Citizens’ All Black Tour Association which had been formed in various centres throughout the Dominion, was established. The conference pledged itself to promote, through its constituent branches, a nation-wide petition protesting against the New Zealand Rugby Union’s decision to exclude Maoris from the South African tour and calling for the abandonment of the tour if absolute equality of treatment could not be assured to members of a team selected on merit alone. *

Fifty delegates attended the conference. They represented the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, the Methodist international affairs committee, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Roman Catholic Church, the New Zealand * Labourers’ Union, the Warehousemen and Bulk Store Workers’ Union, the Freezing Workers’ Union, the Public Service Association the Dunedin and Christchurch Citizens’ All Black Tour Association groups, the Wellington Churches of Christ, the New Zealand Railway Tradesmen’s Association, the Drivers’ Union, the Carpenters’ Union, and New Zealand university students. “We represent the element of New Zealand society which has been outraged by the New Zealand Rugby Union’s decision to exclude Maoris from the 1960 All Black tour of South Africa,” said the chairman of the conference (Mr Roland O’Regan). “We demand that if Maoris are not eligible then the tour should be abandoned. A Rugby tour is not too high a cost to pay for the priceless pearl of racial equality.” Mr O’Regan sharply criticised New Zealand's politicians for their Silence in the tour controversy. “We badly need a clear state-

ment from both political parties on their goals in Maori-pakeha relations.” The silence of the politicians had .greatly damaged New Zealand abroad. In the eyes of other peoples it had given official approval to the N.Z.R.U.’s decision.

The decision meant that the union would now have to dig into the ancestry of footballers to see if they were eligible for the tour.

Mr O’Regan claimed that 17 of the 60 players who took part in recent trials had some Maori blood, along with 500,000 other New Zealanders.

“The Rugby Union has never yet defined how much, if any, Maori blood it will be prepared to accept in a player. The idea of searching a player’s family tree is repugnant to New Zealanders. That is the method of the racial purists of Nazi Germany and of South Africa.” Mr O’Regan said much good had already come from the association’s protests.

“We have shaken New Zealand’s complacency in the traditional belief that there is no colour bar here. No-one can be as sure of that now as they were once.

“We have brought about an examination of the national conscience at a time when it was needed,” he said. He claimed that racial tension was increasing in New Zealand, as the Maori population increased and more Maoris moved into cities. “We are not protesting about some little thing like a Maori being shut out by a publican. A national sporting body has made a decision which is flagrant discrimination.”

The association’s protest had also made it clear that all was not well in the New Zealand Broadcasting Service, which until recently banned all reference to the tour controversy.

I “This is monstrous,” Mr O’Regan said. “It is a betrayal of social responsibility." Accurate, objective, uncensored new’s bulletins were demanded of the newspapers. That standard should apply to broadcast news, too. The public should get an objective service by right. Through the controversy, the public had realised the fault in the Broadcasting Service. He hoped there would be a public demand to set it right. Recently, the Broadcasting Service had modified its ban in response to public feelings. But all mention of the controversy was still banned on Maori news services.

“The fact that this is a State senrice makes it worse. Censorship was the method of the tyrants of the Second World War.”

Mr O’Regan also claimed that recent events had shown the Maori Advisory Board to be nothing more than “window dressing.” Its members represented few Maoris but themselves.

“We will continue our protest with all our power. I hope this conference will make that protest effective," he said.