Would Merge Defence With Australia

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

Would Merge Defence With Australia

A Social Credit government would integrate defence forces with Australia where possible, but would preserve New Zealand’s status as a sovereign state, said the Social Credit candidate for Lyttelton, Mr C. Munnings, in the Sumner Community Centre last night. There was an audience of four. The candidate had been asked to comment on the free trade agreement and whether New Zealand would be better off as a state of Australia. “My experience of the Aussies is that they play it hard, whether it is cricket or living, and I would like to have a look at the agreement from the inside before I comment on that,” Mr Munnings said. A questioner asked for the candidate’s opinion on the effects of “someone like Lord Thomson taking over a newspaper here.” Mr Munnings said he agreed with the party’s leader, Mr Cracknell, who had said a limited amount of outside influence could help the country’s journalism, and the truth getting through. However, the newspapers in New Zealand were held in high regard, although he agreed it was the opinion of journalists that overseas influence could have a beneficial effect.

Mr Munnings said the Lyttelton tunnel project was a good illustration of the different ways of financing. The National Government had built the tunnel, a £3l million project, and in 54 years of tolling, the taxpayers would have repaid £lll million in capital and interest. Social Credit would have paid £3} million, either by a Reserve Bank advance, or from the National Road Fund. This would mean no interest and no tolling. The Labour Party said it would phase out tolling in five years. But this miy underlined the fact that Social Credit was right in the first place. Social Credit would institute a vigorous search for new markets, and would give credits to hungry countries so they could eat now. Mr Munnings said. As they lifted their production in their particular commodity, New Zea-

land could take enough to square the account.

India had said it wanted trade, not aid. Consumption of meat was 11b per person per year; in Paparua Prison, it was lib per day. But if India’s consumption was doubled to 21b per person per year, New Zealand could not supply its needs. India had a steel industry, and could supply New Zealand. In this way, a hungry country could be helped by way of trade. Social Credit would help in any way it could to bring up the standard of living in developing countries. The farmers could then be asked to produce all they could to feed a hungry world, and production could be expanded enormously.

Mr Munnings advocated a boost for tourism in the South Island, saying that many tourists “are left in the stinks at Rotorua far too long.” A circuit through the Haast Pass, Southern Lakes, back to Christchurch and to the Sounds, through Nelson and down the West Coast would be an eye-opener for many people. Social Credit would come to the aid of private enterprise and make sure there was enough beds in an industry, the surface of which had not yet been scratched.

“The scenery is there, but a vigorous air policy and much increased accommodation is urgently needed,” he said. “This is the most desirable way to attract overseas visitors and much-needed dollar earnings. The candidate illustrated his support for New Zealand’s military commitment to the Vietnam war by reading a copy of a letter from an author, John Steinbeck, who had a 20-year-old son fighting in Vietnam to a Soviet poet.

Social Credit would stay with the S.E.A.T.O. and A.N.Z.U.S. agreements and those seeking to ston communist aggression in Vietnam, instead of elsewhere in the Pacific.

The party had a comprehensive education policy, both for town and country schools, and would build towards a fully-trained staff with a limit of 35 pupils a teacher, Mr Munnings said. Country schools would be helped in that high schools in country areas would become T <’orm I to VI schools. There would be extra incentives for teachers prepared to serve in country districts. The trading banks put about £4O million a year new money into circulation, but as a debt, Mr Munnings said. Under Social Credit, this new money would come from the Reserve Bank, interest free. It would be spent into the economy through pensions, where it would speedily be spent by the pension recipients and would not inflate as much as new money coming in as a debt. There was another £39 million being paid between Government departments. The education Department, for example, was lending the State Advances Corporation money at 5 per cent. This was ridiculous when all departments were all part of the same Government administration, yet these interest charges were building up costs of the various depart ments. Mr Munnings said local body finance had risen alarmingly. Social Credit would advance necessary loans at 1 per cent from the Reserve Bank.