Nelson Labour chairman resigns

Press, 30 July 1980, Page 2

Nelson Labour chairman resigns

PA Nelsen The chairman of the Nelson branch of the Labour Party, Mr A. D. Kelly, said, yesterday that he had resigned because of the way certain party officials had treated the member of Parliament for Nelson, Mr Courtney.

Mr Courtney said last week that he would not seek the Labour nomination for the 1981 General Election.

On Monday evening the branch held a meeting, attended by 25 people, which passed a vote of confidence in Mr Courtney. Mr Kelly did not attend the meeting. Mr Kelly said yesterday that he had resigned as chairman of the branch and as a member of the Labour electorate committee. He had been an active supporter of Mr Courtney since the latter’s nomination in 1975. Mr Courtney had “done a reasonable "job” as a member of Parliament,

“I don’t agree with everything he says but members of Parliament should be allowed to express their opinions,” said Mr Kelly. “I think Mel Courtney did the only honourable thing left to him.” This is not the first time Mr Kelly has stood down from a Labour post. In 1978, he refused re-election as treasurer of the branch after the party had “dumped” Mr J. G. O’Brien as the candidate for Island Bay. Mr Kelly said that Mr O’Brien had been hounded and treated as if he had acted criminally. Mr Kelly was made a life member of the party in 1978. He has been a member for 30 years. He said that if Mr Courtney stood in Nelson as an Independent he would actively campaign for him. The newly elected branch representative on the Nelson Labour electorate committee, Mrs May Ryan, said yesterday that Monday’s, meeting of the branch had been “a somewhat disjointed and often noisy affair,” the Courtney controversy taking up most of the ' members' time.

“Finally, however, the meeting passed a vote of confidence in Mr Courtney as their member of Parliament while somewhat grudgingly admitting his right not to seek re-election for 1981,” said Mrs Ryan. “The 'resignation of Mr Kelly was accepted with regret and no discussion except the remark that this resignation was Mr Kelly’s second,in two years.”