Lack Of Raw Materials Worries Candidate

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31224, 23 November 1966, Page 22

Lack Of Raw Materials Worries Candidate

The Government was allowing the import of luxury goods while many manufacturers were unable to get the raw materials to carry on, the sitting Labour member for Christchurch Central (Mr R. M. Macfarlane) told an audience of about 20 last night. Many small manufacturers in Christchurch had been among those who had suffered and in Auckland some had been forced out of business. Mr Macfarlane said he had had the utmost difficulty in helping such people in his electorate and on many occasions had found that there was nothing he could do. He admitted that the Labour Party would have to continue import controls but said they would be aimed in the right direction. He said the Government’s restrictions on building activity had held up progress on many commercial undertakings in Christchurch.

“The Government has not adhered to its policy of free and unrestricted trade,” he said. Mr Macfarlane promised the re-introduction of the Fair Rents Act abolished by the Government. He said there were hundreds of people, particularly in Wellington, who were suffering hardship by having to pay high rents for hovels. He said the Minister of Social Security (Mr McKay) had refused to investigate complaints uncovered by the

Leader of the Opposition (Mr Kirk). Mr McKay had also made “an absolutely incorrect statement” in claiming that the Government had introduced subsidised housing for pensioners. “I was Mayor of Christchurch in 1938 when the Labour Government subsidised the first pensioner cottages built in New Zealand by the City Council at Sydenham,” he said. Mr Macfarlane said it was all too clear that any application to the Arbitration Court for a general wage rise immediately prompted merchants to raise prices. Labour would stop this by freezing prices until the application had been heard and make any wage increases retrospective to the date of the application.