'No split’ in Values

Press, 15 June 1979, Page 4

'No split’ in Values

The Values Party is in no have got good support, and danger of a split, according we have a sense of directto its leader (Ms Margaret ion,” said Ms Crozier. Crozier), “There has to be a whole Referring to the resigna- rethink in the country, and tion of the former leader of we have an extremely imthe party, Mr A. H. Kunow- portant contribution to ski, she said that if there was make.” a split it would have oc- Ms Crozier said there was curred at the party confer- no question of Values ence at which Mr Kunowski becoming either a political had lost the leadership. “A split did not materialise then: the spirit at the end of the conference was one of reunifying the party,” Ms Crozier said in Christchurch. An indication of that spirit was that the party’s election debt of about $12,000 had been halved by a collection of $6OOO from the floor of the conference. The party was now out of debt to anyone outside the party. Branch pledges after the conference had been up 600 per cent and the party was interviewing applicants for a full-time paid administrative job in Wellington. Those who left the party in search of new structures would find themselves in political obscurity, a fate which Mr Kunowski had predicted for the Values Party. “We are working now, we

party or just a pressure group. It would be both, bringing issues before the public and showing people what they could do to change New Zealand. Values could no longer be regarded as an "airy fairy” party. The ideals it had preached five years ago were realities now.