Labour policies

Press, 3 April 1989, Page 20

Labour policies

Sir, —Records show that the much-maligned Coates-Forbes Government of depression years left the first Labour Government around SI7OM debt-free. The problem confronting the second Labour Government in 1957 was that Walter Nash, desperate to become Prime Minister, had promised to double the child allowance, to supply free textbooks to schools and to allow electors $2OO. In 1975 the .revolutionary Muldoon retirement scheme of 80 per cent of the average wage at 60 years outbid that of Roger Douglas, whose first move in 1984 was to break his election assurance by imposing a surtax on elderly superannuitants who had saved for retirement. By comparison with honest, humble leaders like Massey, Coates, Forbes, Savage, Fraser, Holland, Holyoake, Nordmeyer and Kirk, the present Government appears arrogant and self-centred. The policies of Messrs Lange, Douglas and de Cleene have worked for the benefit of Government members and the rich and not for the needy.—Yours, etc.,

TED MULCOCK. March 30, 1989.

Sir, —N. D. Rankin (March 25) says he cannot see how anyone with a brain and a conscience can continue to support our present Government. I can assure your correspondent that I do, indeed, have a conscience and fairly serviceable brain matter, but nevertheless continue to support Labour. There are two main reasons for my loyalty, one of which is the spectacle of a disorganised National Party, rent by internal dissent and bereft of clear policies and which, I am sure, would be worse than “the devil we know.” The second, and more important reason, is that our present Government has at least stood firm on its nuclear-free stance in foreign policy, and it appears that a National Government would once again allow nuclear weaponry into New Zealand. As a superannuitant, I have been disadvantaged by Labour’s financial policies, but that is not, in my opinion, reason enough to support an Opposition which has neither clear leadership nor policy.—Yours, etc., R. L. PLUCK. March 27, 1989.