KEEP INDUSTRY MOVING

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 153, 25 March 1937, Page 10

KEEP INDUSTRY MOVING

All Have Responsibility PRIME MINISTER’S APPEAL Foundation of Democracy "If democracy is to live in New Zealand we want the assistance ol all engaged in industry, wage-earner and employer alike, to see that things are kept running.” said the Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. M. J. Savage, when speaking in the Wellington Town Hall last night. “We are not- going to solve anything by stopping the machinery of production, except perhaps to kill democracy in our own homestead. There is only one thing that can stop ns and that is to be crucified in the house of our friends. I hope that is not going to happen; I don't think it will.” Mr. Savage said that the foundation of democracy was in industry, and he hoped that all engaged in industry would do their part while lie was away. "We will do the job all right,” lie added, “but if we start out like a team of jibbing horses, one pulling and anothers sitting back in the breeching, as it were, we are not going to get very far. The machinery has to be kept going all the lime.”

Mr. Savage said that the people had elected a Government to represent them and it was not too much to ask them to be loyal to those who had been placed in office. He re|H-ated that if democracy were to live its foundation must rest in industry. It could not be laid anywhere else. At this stage the Prime Minister was interrupted by a man whose remark was not audible. Continuing. .Mr. Savage said : “Those responsible for the machinery of production have a responsibility that is no less than the responsibility of Ministers of the Crown. Ministers of the Crown at the present time number 13;' now then, that is not a very large number. We are not. going to sidestep or minimise our responsibilities, but I want to tell you, ladies and gentlemen, and the individual who interjected, that yon have a responsibility as well as I. Unless you do your job, what can I do alone?”

Replying to a further interjection, Mr. Savage said: "Don't start to tell me what the average wage-earner has to put up with. 1 have been an average wage-earner. T. have spent a life-time at it, and where men work the hardest —in the bowels of the earth. (Applause.) "1 don't want anyone to tell me what the average wage-earner has to put up with, but 1 say to the average wage-earner that if democracy Is to live in New Zealand tie has a re. sponsibility just as much as I have. "Don't make tiny mistake about it. we are living in a changing age when democracies are falling and individuals are becoming victims of the rifle. We don't want anything of that sort in New Zealand or in the British Commonwealth of Nations. The British Commonwealth is one of the bright specks on the earth to-day. We can improve on it all right, but b.v the Lord Harry if I have to be found alive or dead let it be in the British Commonwealth, where there is some semblance of freedom left." (Loud applause.) “And, ladies and gentlemen,” added Bit. Savage, "the British Commonwealth is not the only place, either. There are other places, but we have a responsibility in New Zealand and the peoples right throughout the Commonwealth have a responsibility, too, to share in the shaping of human destiny. Don’t start to blame someone somewhere else. Let us put our own house in order. I am sure we can do it.”