AN INDEPENDENT LABOUR CANDIDATE

Evening Post, Volume XCVIII, Issue 138, 9 December 1919, Page 6

AN INDEPENDENT LABOUR CANDIDATE

WHY 5E STOOD DOWN.

OUTSPOKEN CRITICISM OF OFFICIAL PARTY. ".'

(81 IBL^GEiEfl.—ppcjil TO THB F-OSI.J DUNEDIN, This Day. Mr. W. P. Black, in announcing his f rounds for withdrawing from the Dunein South contest, gays: "The present crisis, is npt one where, the electors should consider entirely the persona! ability or.indiyidual merits of-the candidates. The candidates of the New Zealand Labour 'Pari;y,"a}ia6 th,e Federation of Labour, alias the I.W.W-. have, given a cast-iron,, pledge; to that party ftnd thejr written assent to bo controlled and domin4ted ( by that party machine, or resign their eeats and retire crushed. They have given their signed resignations to the machine, to be used for this purpose if at any time they d<pre assert their independence. Consequently, the candidates must be judgepj by that party's records and history.' The party machine.is run and controlled by con : victed disloyalists and sedition-mongers, and its opinions voiced by an official organ recently convicted pf. publishing seditious matter, and universally condemned for-a vile and scurrilous attack on our soldier-members of Parliament. It is a party which declared at the put: break pf the war that its attitude was ' one of 'dignified neutrality,' , although 'dignity' is the last grace anyone who knows them, wpuld associate with that party or their mob' followers. It is ttye. same party which never lifted a hand or voice during the war to help the country or those defending it. The only time it lifted its voice was to talk disloyalty or urge the grievances of the shirkere and slackers. When peace was declared the party ;in the name of 'Labour,' declined to participate IB the celebrations, as tile, peace terms were too hard on the poor German_ workers. At the last conference pf the New Zealand Labour Party, in June, a (series of ; resolutions was carried protesting ■ against the. terms of peace as being top oppressive on Gprmariy. Mr. Paul presided at that conference as the President pf the party. Did he support, these resolutions or oppose them? Ask him. Did Mr. Walker a oppose them? Ask him. The resolutions read as though the conference were almost sorry Germany lost. Yet this party lias the brazen audacity to claim to voice tho sentiments and feelings of. the workers of New Zealand and their women folk. -That same party sent the infamous manifesto to Austraha at a time' when conscription wa6 - sorely needed to round up the shirkers and maintain reinforcements. Messrs. Paul and Walker are now busy explaining why they signed the manifesto, although they did not like it, but all they have proved is that loyalty to their party machine, and. its bosses comes before loyalty to their country and those fighting w defend it."