MR R. WILSON ‘Area priorities wrong’

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33981, 23 October 1975, Page 5

MR R. WILSON ‘Area priorities wrong’

Roger Wilson, aged 22. the Values Party candidate for St Albans, says, that St Albans people are not getting what they wanted and that the existing authorities had their priorities for the area wrong.

He says that the most important thing for the area is flood control but they had got a motorway. “It boils down to the fact that people in St Albans have no control over their own destinies”. Mr Wilson, who is a structural engineer and unmarried. joined the Values party from a sense of frustration with the existing political institutions which he says are out of touch with the rest of the community. He says, that his own profession is not very aware of the sort of problems that people face and does not take much interest in environmental and social issues.

“I don't think people are going to be voting on issues in this election although I'wish they were. "In most elections people vote on traditional lines. I have been canvassing since May and 1 find that people are generally sympathetic to Values but they are a little bit hesitant about committing their vote. “The problem lies in the fact that we are such a different type of party, and it is difficult for people to identify us as being credible.” But he says the most important problem in the electorate is the poor drainage. A public meeting was held a few weeks ago and a sub-committee was set up to investigate the possibility of working further up from the Dudley Creek diversion because the present diversion would not help the people in the northern area of St Albans. He says the Values Party is not the sort of

party that will disappear after the election and reappear at the next one; it is also a social movement and during next year would try to put some of its, policies into action — such as setting up a cooperative business to show that it can be done successfully and getting involved in local issues.

Mr Wilson says he is standing for Parliament because he is angry. “Both the other main parties

have shown their determination to lead us along a path which is not in the interests of the nation. They are so obsessed with retaining or regaining power every three years that they are prepared to commit the follies that are leading us to social, economic and environmental chaos.

“Most people realise that the system is due for an overhaul but no one is prepared to do it. Past governments have been more interested in pandering to the vested interests under the guise of political expediency than in looking after the people of New Zealand.

“The Values Party will change all that. The people of New Zealand are its prime asset. It is our needs that the Government should be satisfying and this is impossible when many of our representatives. directly or indirectly, have a conflict of interests between their own pockets and good government.”