CRY FOR FUSION

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 51, 24 November 1930, Page 13

CRY FOR FUSION

Reform and United

MR McLEOD’S WARNING Australian Example By Telegraph—Preus Association. Timaru, November 23. Addressing a meeting of Refornl supporters at Timaru on Saturday evening, the Hon. A. D. McLeod made reference to the persistent cry from certain quarters for fusion of the Reform and United Parties against the forces of political Labour. Those urging such a course, said Mr. McLeod, were, he feared, poor students of contemporary political history. In Australia of recent years, largely as a result of pressure from the influential city press .and city electorates, fusion had taken place in the Commonwealth and all State Parliaments. In every instance the Country Party, which prior to fusion had not been taken seriously, immediately became a strong'and vital force in Australian' politics, and although having no such intention certainly assisted rather than weakened political Labour’s position. Was there a likelihood of anything different happening in New Zealand? In the North Island at least he' had little hesitation in saying that fusion would bring about at the next election in rural electorates a crop of Country Party candidates who would poll a very large number of votes. The plain truth, said Mr. McLeod, was that here, no more than in Australia, with or without reason, farmers and numbers of small country people, did not trust the motives which lay behind city electoial intentions, and no greater blow was struck in recent years against Retoim than the assiduous spreading by opponents of the tale among farmers that as a party Reform was bound hand and toot to city interests.