National must change—Mr McLay

Press, 22 September 1984, Page 6

National must change—Mr McLay

PA Wellington Voters would not re-elect the National Party until they saw the party had changed, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, Mr McLay, has said. The greatest mistake National could make would be to tell New Zealanders they made a mistake electing Labour and to try to justify all the policies the former Government pursued, Mr McLay said in a speech to the Young Nationals in Dunedin.

“The blunt truth is that we lost. Labour, which had been virtually level pegging with us in the opinion polls throughout the year, outshone us in virtually every aspect of the campaign/’he said. “They tanned our hides.

“What we’ve got to say to the New Zealanders who gave us that result is that we were listening to what you said and that we heard you. We must not and will not tell . New Zealanders that they were wrong,” said Mr McLay. “Rather we must spend our time finding out where we went wrong, what our mistakes were.

“What they did vote for was change, and they will not re-elect us until they see that we have changed.” Mr McLay said that National’s beliefs in democracy, free competitive enterprise, freedom and the

rule of law had been proved in practice. Now the party had to formulate new policies from those beliefs. One of the very clear messages National’s Parliamentary wing had received was that people thought the National Government was not listening.

Mr McLay suggested that the Party might write into its rules a requirement that each of the five divisions should hold a policy conference each year, with the understanding that the attendance of members of Parliament would be considered obligatory. “We would not debate remits (which are better left to our ordinary conferences) but rather would consider a smaller number of in-depth papers,” he said. "Maybe those conferences, in turn, could be supplemented by a further annual policy seminar held in each of the North and South Islands.”

Mr McLay said the'question of the relationship of the party with its members of Parliament had' to,be addressed now, hot resolved when National regained the Treasury benches.