Labour’s liberals bide their time

Press, Issue 33846, 19 May 1975, Page 2

Labour’s liberals bide their time

(From OLIVER RIDDELL. Wellington reporter of "The Press")

Confidence for the General Election and confidence for the future were the keynotes of the fiftyninth annual conference of the Labour Party, which met in Wellington last week.

The conference was extended from the usual four days to five, but even that was not enough to enable delegates to complete the 187 remits before it.

The conference sat for 411 hours, of which five hours was devoted to visiting speakers. In previous years, the party bosses have laid themselves open to the charge that they have manipulated the conference. Such was not the case this year: the extra day, the patent desire of the chair to expedite matters, and the general feeling of confidence and bonhomie in election year combined to create a relaxed and comfortable feeling among the more than 600 who attended. The need to win in November was uppermost in every mind: no matter how contentious the issue or how divided the conference, the delegates were determined not to lose their good-will for ea'’*’ other.

There were plenty of opportunities for ill-feeling. The party was deenly divided on law and order and on abortion.

Hardliners win

On law and order, the hardliners had their way, as thev did on abortion, but in conversation afterwards it was apparent that the softliners were reasonably haopv with the wav things had gone. They were happy that the law and order issues had received such a good airing, and they were confident that thev would get their wav in the nartv some dav On abortion, the liberals (who were not exactlv the same group as had adopted the soft line on law and order) were less happy, because the Hospitals Amendment Bill will have its third reading in Parliament this week, and the liberals felt that thev had lost ground bv not getting a vote in opposition to it.

Voting patterns Voting patterns caused some surprise, as the unions were not able to dominate the conference on the matters thev promoted as thev had been able to do in previous years. Thev supplied 419 of the 968 votes, which should have been enough for them to hold the balance of power, as they were far better organised to vote as a block than the branch delegates On some issues they did hold the balance of power, but not sufficiently to get their own wav on industrial matters, and their support for a softening of the penalties relating to drugs was not enough to overrule the hardliners. In defence the doves were not strong enough to carry the conference, yet the liberals (on social issues) were powerful enough to alter a number of important health and iustice resolutions in their favour. It was difficult to predict voting patterns right to the; end of the conference: one of; the main reasons for this was the deliberate efforts by the; party president (Dr C. M., Bennett) and the senior vicepresident, Mr J. G. O'Brien, in their capacity as alternating chairmen, to bend over backwards to let the liberals | have their say. This was a more sensible, approach than had beem adopted at previous conferences. where the liberals had had some reason for: believing that the chair was working against them. The concern of the party bosses with fanning was underlined by the Prime Min-

ister (Mr Rowling) in his fine address on the Monday night when he singled out the president of Federated Facers (Mr J. T. Kneebone) f< curable mention.

quoted Mr Kneebone as ving said publicly that all the great strides forward in agriculture in New Zealand had been taken under! Labour governments. This received a special cheer. Few new personalities I emerged at the conference, I but three of the committee | conveners enhanced their reputations: Mrs D. C. Jellicich (Hamilton West), iMr T. K. Burke (Rangiora), iand Mr J. B. Munro (InverI cargill). No single delegate stood out as being likely to i sway the meeting, and problably only between 10 and 15 per cent of delegates spoke at all.

Mr Muldoon

But if any one person could be said to have dominated the conference, it was a man who did not even attend — the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Muldoon). Criticism of him often rose to hysterical proportions. The most hysterical of all the Muldoon bashers was undoubtedly the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Tizard), who, on the opening night,

went well beyond the bounds of good taste and common sense.

This preoccupation with Mr Muldoon was one of the clearest manifestations to emerge that the party is not as confident about the result of the General Election as it likes to make out.

This feeling was best expressed by the secretary of the Federation of Labour (Mr W. J. Knox) when he told delegates that they were the converted, and they still had the job of convincing the unconverted. This sentiment was echoed by Dr Bennett in his closing address.

It was not the economic and social issues which aroused the emotions of delegates, but those relating to law and legislation. The confidence the delegates showed in the members of Cabinet was never stretched except over the law and legislation on the law, and the Minister of Justice (Dr Finlay) is plainly sitting on a powderkeg. The liberals served notice to him that they will light the fuse at next year’s conference if Labour is returned and more has not been achieved.

Economic affairs

The failure of delegates to get more stirred up about economic matters was rather baffling. Certainly, they had confidence in the Cabinet-— particularly in the Prime Minister—but while everyone acknowledged that New Zealand faced economic difficulties, virtually nothing came out of the conference to .give an indication how the party thought the economic problems should be tackled. The recommendations of tlie finance and taxation committee were bland, and aroused little interest.

In effect, the conference told the Government that economic matters were its concern, that it was expected to lead, and (by inference) that it would take any blame if things went wrong.