Address-In-Reply Debate Opens

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31993, 21 May 1969, Page 30

Address-In-Reply Debate Opens

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, May 20. The continuing overriding threat of Chinese aggression and infiltration had serious implications for New Zealand’s future defence and trade development, the National member of Parliament for Rotorua, Mr H. R. Lapwood, told Parliament tonight.

New Zealand was living in a world of uncertainty where smaller nations were fighting for national independence and the larger nations were fighting for economic stability, he said. Dressed in white tie and tails, Mr Lapwood was formally moving that “a respectful address” be presented to the Governor-General (Sir Arthur Porritt), in reply to the Speech from the Throne last week at the opening of Parliament. The chain of developing countries surrounding China was New Zealand’s first line of defence against the “everexistent pressures of Chairman Mao’s thought.”

“We cannot stand aloof 1 from these problems. We ' cannot rely on false images of insulating ourselves from the immediate environment of ; South-East Asia which is constricting upon us through , transport, communication and , technical advances. Sheet Anchors 1 "Australia and New Zea- 1 land are the sheet anchors of ; stability in the rapidly devel- 1 oping region of South-East Asia,” he said. , New Zealand, said Mr Lap- ] wood, had a duty and a loyalty j to its Asian friends and neigh- ] hours.

“We have a duty to stand by them in difficulty and a loyalty that develops from membership in a geographic family. But Mr Lapwood, a retired policeman, warned that the fulfilment of New Zealand’s expected role in South-East Asia was equally dependent on the country’s ability to stand on its own feet in the highly competitive world at large.

Dealing with Government encouragement of technical institutes, Mr Lapwood said:— “Equal Potential” “While there is no doubt that the possession of an academic degree may well be the passport to executive status and membership of a thinking intellectual group of the future, I am not satisfied that an academic degree is the only yardstick of one’s ability

to make a maximum contribution to society. “Not all of us are required by nature to revel in book learning. “There are many whose inclinations lean toward manual dexterity and whatever the future may hold it is certain that the technician on the job has an equal potential to j apply initiative and create' badly needed innovation. ( “A new breed of skilled people, divorced from the hallowed halls of academic learning is being created—the technicians,” said Mr Lapwood.