Phones busy with support

Press, 13 March 1985, Page 1

Phones busy with support

Support for the Sunday Club, the National Party ginger group, is much stronger and more widespread than expected, according to the club’s spokesman.

Mr Alex Hoggan said that after news media reports about the new group yesterday, he had been inundated with telephone calls of support from all over New Zealand. Many callers were asking how to join the group. He dismissed reaction from National Party officials and members of Parliament that they had not heard of the group and that it was probably a oneman band.

“They would not have heard of the club because we have only just made ourselves known. They certainly would have heard of some of our members, because some of them are in executive positions,” he

said. ! . “It just goes to strengthen my opinion that there are a lot of things going on that they are not aware of. If they do not know what their own people are doing, they can hardly expect to know what their opposition is doing,” Mr Hoggan said. He was’ still not able to give the names of other people involved in the group or reveal how many supporters it had. He hoped to do so later this week after consulting members in other centres. Mr Hoggan said that he was the chairman of a Lyttelton branch of the National Party until last year, but he had not renewed his membership. A former National Cabinet Minister, Mr Bert Walker, said that he had known of the existence of the group -for several weeks.

He has been invited to join. Mr Walker, who has been a strong supporter of the former National leader, Sir Robert Muldoon, and a critic of the party’s organisation, said he could not disagree with some of the comments made by the group. They were views that he heard expressed frequently. “They are people who are good National Party supporters who are concerned that the party is not kicking over as they feel it should do, or as some say it used to, and their aim is to make it strong again,” he said. He believed that the club was widespread and as well supported as it claimed. A number of Sunday Clubs or ginger groups have been formed in the Hawke’s Bay area, a National Party member confirmed last evening.

The spokesman, who has,, in the past been outspoken in his support for Sir Robert Muldoon’s leadership, said the formation of the groups was not a deliberate move but the result of a groundswell of opinion among “pro Rob” party members who were not completely happy with the way the party had handled its attack on the Government.

“There is a general feeling in Hawke’s Bay that we have got Labour on the ropes, but no-one is going in for the killer punch,” he said.

He believed the Government should be attacked on its economic performance, particularly rising interest rates and food prices. “A.N.Z.U.S. is important, but the average man votes from his pocket, not his ideals,” he said. He did not know how many supporters the groups had, but said this feeling of dissatisfaction had been growing for the last three or four months. He said that the ginger groups, which he preferred to call them, were not breakaway organisations but groups within the party.