General Election LACK OF EXPERIENCE IN DIRECTION

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 309, 24 September 1943, Page 9

General Election LACK OF EXPERIENCE IN DIRECTION

Government And War

Effort

INDEPENDENT’S OPINION’ Dominion Special Service. . TAUMARUNUI, September 22. In spite of the handicaps of regulations, and restrictions and all the Government bungling that had oeurred. the peoply of New Zealand had risen superior to their Government and had produced a war effort that was admired bv leaders of the Allied cause, said Mr. Digby Perrett,- Independent candidate for VVaimarino, addressing a wellattended meeting in the Theatre Royal here tonight. New Zealanders, he added, had done the work, fought the battles, and found the money. It was nothing short of nauseating to hear the Government claim the credit to bolster up the party machine. This was sheer iinpertiuence. . . “The control of our war effort should be taken away from parties whose unseemly, petty wrangling over the air from Parliament has caused their listeners to turn away in disgust and bitter disappointment,” said the candidate. Ihe personnel of the Independent Group had been carefully selected from many walks of life, and the speaker his audience that while intensely individualistic in their personality find outlook, these candidates had met in conference and bad compiled, and unanimously approved, a plan for national construction. Their object was a united, non-party Government. and if elected in sufficient numbers to form a Government, they would have some prospect of uniting Parliament into a working force of patriotic New Zealanders, determined to unify Parliament and people in a great effort that would demonstrate to other lands the country’s ability to set its own house in order. “I believe that our total war effort could have been greater if it had* been more wisely directed, and I agree with Mr. J. A. Lee that we should have done vastly more at home and a little less on the field of battle,” Mr. Perrett said “.Industry could and would have been better organized if Government control had given place to control of industries by committees representative of both workers and management, as was done in England. Production control should be in the hands of the producers, and manpower committees should haver been chosen’from each industry to deni only with the men in that industry. This applies with double force when industry is classed as essential. “Shockingly Mismanaged.” “My own industry—the timber-indus-try—has been shockingly mismanaged by lack of knowledge on the part of the manpower committees, who have had to deal with all classes of industry and cannot possibly have the intensive knowledge of anv one industry which would qualify them even to understand, the problems they are called on to decide. Men with a lifetime of experience should have.been appointed to control imports, deal with appeal cases, allocate labour, and distri■bute products.” The speaker urged the establishment of co-operative councils of workers ana managements, whose representatives, together with those of the fighting services and the Minister of War Services, would form a Supreme War Council. This body would be responsible only to Parliament, and thus to the people who, through the House of Representatives, would know what was being done, how it was being done, and why it was being done. This Council would be given certain powers to be defined by Parliament, and would work through national and local industrial and production councils. “Such a system would achieve the utmost efficiency. It would be government through the people, and not government. bv individuals who often know practically'nothing of the circumstances of the people for whom they lay down their multitudinous rules, and forms and regulations to the hampering of peoples efforts.” said Mr. Perrett.. He also'urged that more authority be given to Parliament. Possibly. .be said, Parliament could be more effective if reduced in numbers. and the Independent Group proposed carrying this into effect if given the opportunity. ' , .