ROCHDALE BOROUGH COUNCILLORS

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 147, 18 March 1937, Page 15

ROCHDALE BOROUGH COUNCILLORS

Visit to New Zealand Two members of the Rochdale Borough Council, a municipality near Manchester, were passengers in the Whip ganella which arrived at Wellington yesterday from Sydney. They are Messrs. J. Duckworth and A. W. Me-Kay-Menzies, both of whom are making their first visit to New Zealand in the course of a world tour. Mr. Duckworth said he had saved for 50 years for the trip and was delighted with what he had seen thus fat of the Empire countries beyond the seas. He told “The Dominion'’ t hat his father, the late Sir James Duckworth, a member of the House of Commons at the time, visited New Zealand 50 year* ago.

Rochdale, said Mr. Duckworth, had a population of 05,000 and was acknowledged to be one of the best-governed local bodies in the north of England. It was the birthplace of John Bright, and Richard Cobden had represented the constituency in the Commons. The borough reflected the general improvement in the economic condition of the United Kingdom. At its peak during the worst years of the depression unemployment placed 18,000 workers on the dole. The total had now fallen to between 6000 and 7000, the improvement being independent of the fillip given to trade by the rearmament programme, which had only recently got fairly under way. Mr. Duckworth said the policy of New Zealand’s Labour Government was being watched in Britain with close interest. Rochdale itself had a Labour mayor at the present, time. Any suggestion that the jteople of Britain were cooling off in their regard for the Dominions was contrary to fact, said Mr, Duckworth. On the contrary, there was the greatest enthusiasm for Australia and New Zealand. The people of the Old Country were most anxious that good trade relations between Britain and the Dominions should be preserved.

Speaking of the reaction of the public in Britain to the constitutional crisis involving the ex-King and Parliament, Mr. Duckworth said it was now clear that, the then King had mistaken the trend of public opinion. He had formed the belief that lie could continue to wear the Crown and at the same time marry Mrs. Simpson. He had been led to that, belief by the attitude of tliq so-called popular Press, but completely misjudged the public mind, which was set. resolutely behind the Government in its stand against tile proposed marriage. Almost universally, in the homes of exalted and humble alike, the people would not. have Mrs. Simpson as Queen. The Prime Minister, Mr. Baldwin, won great admiration for his firm and patient handling of a delicate situation and had thereby added to his prestige and set in place the coping stone to his career.

Mr. Duckworth said that. Rochdale was proud of the fact that Miss Grade Fields, the popular film comedienne, was born in the borough, of which she would be given the freedom in July.