Pressure Policy Shunned

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30916, 24 November 1965, Page 1

Pressure Policy Shunned

The secretary of the Canterbury Televiewers’ Association (Mr J. M. McKenzie) said yesterday that the association had never brought pressure to bear on retailers, or any other firms to advertise in the association’s magazine, and did not intend to exert any such pressure in the future.

Mr J. Mathison, M.P., was invited to speak at the halfyearly meeting, said Mr McKenzie. He was a member of the association but was a guest speaker, and his suggestion that pressure be brought to bear on firms to advertise in the association’s magazine was not the established policy of the association but merely his own opinion.

“Under the circumstances, we particularly resent the published remarks of the secretary of the CanterburyWestland Retailers’ Association (Mr N. M. West) that the association has cast aspersions on television retailers without justification. “Mr West is fully aware that approximately two years ago, two senior executive officers of his organisation met

me and the president (Mr J. F. Ablett) in Mr West’s office. On that occasion we produced documentary evidence which showed individual cases, involving substantial sums, where members of the televiewers’ association had been taken for a ride by some retailers in Christchurch. “If Mr West would like me to cite these cases again, for the benefit of the consumer public, I will be glad to oblige him,” Mr McKenzie said.

Mr McKenzie said that Mr West had attempted to belittle the Televiewers' Assoc-

iatlon by saying “there are a number of organisations with considerably more to justify their existence than the Televiewers’ Association." “This is a matter of opinion and no doubt will appear to everyone not a retailer to be a biassed one.

“The association has only one objective as far as retailing is concerned—that the honest traders stay in business and that the sharp ones are put out of business. I have no hesitation in believing that Mr West’s organisation has the same aim,” Mr McKenzie said.