P.M. Criticises Labour Policy On Ky Visit

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31275, 23 January 1967, Page 3

P.M. Criticises Labour Policy On Ky Visit

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, Jan. 22. The Labour Party’s proposals to fall in line again with Federation of Labour policy to boycott the functions for the Prime Minister of South Vietnam showed that Labour had not learned the two main lessons of the last General Election, said the Prime Minister (Mr Holyoake) yesterday. These lessons were: 1. That the people of New Zealand supported the policy of helping defend the people of South Vietnam against communist aggression, and 2. That the people did not like political parties to be dominated by outside organisations which were not responsible to the electorate. Mr Holyoake said the Labour Party was again trying to face both ways at once. If the leader of the Opposition (Mr Kirk) wholeheartedly opposed Air Vice-Marshal Ky’s visit, he would forthrightly

lead protest marches as had the Australian Labour leader, Mr Calwell, or in his absence he could have arranged for his deputy, Mr Watt, who was equally vocal on the subject, to lead the demonstrations. The fact was that the Labour Party did not want to be seen to be too obviously either opposing the tour or supporting it. So the Labour leaders had decided merely just to stay away from the function in a futile gesture. Mr Holyoake said Mr Kirk’s wild statements denouncing so-called proposals for Air Vice-Marshal Ky to bring an armed bodyguard showed the weakness of the Opposition’s case. There were no such proposals. As Mr Kirk could have ascertained, Air Vice-Marshal Ky was not bringing any bodyguards, and security would be the responsibility of the New Zealand police. Mr Holyoake said Labour leaders were hurling insults at the people who were today foremost in the world in upholding the cause of freedom against Communist aggression and subversion. Visit To Vietnam Mr Holyoake said he deplored Mr Kirk’s statement that had he been In New Zealand at the time of the South Vietnamese Prime Minister’s visit he would have refused to receive him and to attend

functions organised In his honour.

“Has Mr Kirk forgotten that only last year he himself took the initiative to secure the visit to Vietnam of a group of parliamentarians, including two Labour members. “Both these members, one of whom was Mr Watt, were particularly insistent in their desire to meet Air ViceMarshal Ky. “This was arranged and a meeting took place. Why, then, if Mr Kirk and Mr Watt found this desirable last year, do they choose to represent it as intolerable now? I wonder, too, if Mr Watt is completely unmindful of the hospitality and courtesy which he received from the Vietnamese Government and people. I can only regard his present attitude as both rude and inconsistent.”

Mr Holyoake also criticised Mr T. E. Skinner, the president of the Federation of Labour, who had claimed to be speaking for “all thinking New Zealanders” when he outlined the manner in which he thought Air Vice-Marshal Ky should be received. Mr Holyoake said there was nothing sinister in the fact that the Governor-General (Sir Bernard Fergusson) would not be meeting Air Vice-Marshal Ky. He was simply on a well-earned holiday.