'Humanitarian issues first’

Press, 15 July 1982, Page 11

'Humanitarian issues first’

The Social Credit Political League gave a higher priority to humanitarian concerns than to legal processes, said a member of the league's political executive, Mr R. R. Bach, yesterday.

Mr Bach, who was concerned in the formulation of the Social Credit proposal to the Government on the Clyde high dam, was commenting on criticisms of the proposal made by Labour’s spokesman on constitutional affairs, Mr G, W. R. Palmer. Mr Palmer’s comments were reported in "The Press” yesterday.

Mr Bach said that Social Credit had looked for a compromise proposal because it put humanitarian issues first. Mr Palmer's principle was that legal processes were more important than humanitarian motives.

Although Social Credit’s proposal followed the rule of law, Mr Bach agreed that it meant in the long run that the league would support empowering legislation for

the Clyde high dam if it was needed.

The league had been prepared to modify its earlier stand because of the human cost among the Clyde workers.

“Nobody is. denying that there are faults in what the Government is doing, but because of the human cost there needs to be some compromise,” Mr Bach said.

He_ said that the league was hot saying that legal processes should be set aside, but in this case the result was more important than the process. -

The league was prepared to make the compromise because it had been assured that the environmental issues would be safeguarded.

Mr Bach said he believed that Social Credit would accept the policy change because the environmental aspect had been safeguarded, and because its leader (Mr Beetham) had “seen his way round” the legal objections.