Mr Jones 'means business’

Press, 13 March 1985, Page 2

Mr Jones 'means business’

By MICHAEL HANNAH in Wellington

The New Zealand Party leader, Mr Bob Jones, says he still “means business” and has already put his name in for the party’s Ohariu candidacy again. Nominations were called for in a public advertisement on Monday evening. Mr Jones said yesterday that his name was already in.

The New Zealand Party aimed to have 40 candidates chosen by the end of this year, and he also already had his election campaign strategies worked out, he said.

Mr Jones stood in Ohariu in the snap General Election last July, taking support away from the then sitting member, the former National Minister of Trade and Industry, Mr Hugh Templeton. The seat was won by the Labour candidate, Mr Peter Dunne. Ohariu is the first seat for

which the New Zealand Party has called nominations for the next election, due in 1987. Mr Jones said he was “very confident” of winning the seat. He considered one or two other seats could be won, though he declined to name them.

He said the early calls for nominations, with an election still about 2% years away, was part of his strategy.

“They serve that important function of letting the public know we are here and we mean business,” he said.

Nominations are likely to be called in the Western Hutt seat also by the end of this month. Nominations for the Ohariu seat close on March 24.

Mr Jones said the party would campaign in the next election on social issues. The Labour Government had implemented many of the economic policies advo-

cated by the New Zealand Party.

“We will compliment the Government on that, but there will be a whole host of other issues to fight,” he said.

The party would concentrate on two issues: the need for education and an attack on what Mr Jones called “welfarism.”

“It is the whole dependent mentality, and whether it is appropriate,” he said.

Law and order would also be an issue the party expected to campaign on, he said.

He still saw a place for the New Zealand Party and predicted that the next election would suit a third party more than the last election had. The change of leadership in the National party had made no difference to the New Zealand Party’s appeal, he said. “They are still the same bunch of sycophants who were there with Muldoon.

They are still defending all the things he did,” he said. “I can see the prospect of quite a groundswell among National Party supporters.” Mr Jones described National members of Parliament as “a conservative rump.” "It is the first time you have seen a party of the Right split into its conservative and liberal factions. “We are the liberal faction. We want to knock out conservatism in this country,” Mr Jones said.