Labour. M.P.s defend right to choose

Press, 2 March 1981, Page 6

Labour. M.P.s defend right to choose

Labour members of Parliament have survived a vote of no confidence in their ability to choose their Parliamentary leader. At the party’s northern South Island regional conference, held in Blenheim at the week-end, members vigorously defended their right to choose their own leader. A Labourers’ '■ Union remit, calling for the party’s, .national conference to be given power to elect the Parliamentary leader, clearly stung members of Parljament and candidates attending the conference. They asserted that the proposal could . split the party and send it into a political Mr P. Woollaston, who is campaigning in the seat held by the Nelson Labour M.P. (Mr M. F. Courtney), asked that the conference not give him “an extra cross to bear.’’ The M.P.S were accused by union and branch, dele-

gates of demonstrating how out of touch they were with their branches in the leadership “debacle” last December. The union remit was rejected by a majority of delegates. In a blistering attack on the. remit, Mr M. K. Moore, the member of Parliament for Papanui, said it. was “destined to divide the party in every way cqnceivable.” He challenged delegates to build a party which would stay together to .win and retain office. He predicted that, if the conference was given the leadership vote, caucuses would arise in every branch and trade union as candidates . manoeuvred to gain maximum support. Mr G. W. R. Palmer (Christchurch Central) said the union’s proposal was undemocratic. It would logically give the Labour conference the power to choose the Prime Minister. Even a presidential-type

election would be bteter than the union’s proposal, but this could produce a Labour or Social i Credit Prime Minister in a Nat-ional-dominated House of Representatives, he said. The present system was. preferable to such a, Labourers’; Union delegate (Mr - Pj E. Piesse) asserted that branches had shown they were responsible enough to elect the party president and national council. “They are equally responsible enough to elect the Parliamentary leader,” Mr Piesse said. The responsibility of M.P.s could be judged by their track record, Mr Piesse said. Mr M. A. Connelly ' (Yaldhurst), defended the present system. M.P.s were the best people to determine their own leader, he said. The leadership vote would be open to manipulation by grouos, which could try to get enough branch members to support their candidate.