PLATFORM POINTS

Evening Post, Volume XCVIII, Issue 139, 10 December 1919, Page 9

PLATFORM POINTS

In speaking at several centres, Mr. W. H. Field, Reform candidate for the Otaki seat, has laid stress on the fact tliat Labour candidates had not replied to the charge of disloyalty, during the war, levelled at leaders of their party by the Mayor of Te Kuiti and the electors of Murchison. This, said Mr. Field, was very significant. He reminded his hearers of the last dying kick of pacifism displayed by Mr. Holland on 13th October, 1918, less than a month before the armistice, when Austria, Turkey, and Bulgaria had surrendered, and it was well known that we had tho Huns on the run and hopelessly beaten, after four and a quartet years of bitter struggle, the sacri; fice of millions of valuable lives, and the untold misery and suffering which these fiends had inflicted on humanity. It was easy, Mr. Field said, to gauge the sympathies of Mr. Holland and his friends from the words he uttered on that occasion: "It seemed to him that peace was the world's supreme need-— that the time to negotiate was now. The New Zealand Parliament should intimate to the Imperial Government that the people of New Zealand are in favour of the discussion of peace terms. They who talked recklessly about refusing- to discuss peace until Germany was beaten to her knees indulged in a wild and criminal bombast for which neither the Labour movement nor the saner elements outside of it could accept responsibility." Peace negotiations at such a time, Mr. Field said, would have been an insult to the memory of those who had died on the battlefield fightiiig bravely for us and for civilisation and freedom.

Mr. Massey is famed for the faithfulness of his old friends, telegraphs a correspondent of The Post, This fact was strikingly demonstrated at his meeting at Tuakau yesterday, when a vote of thanks and confidence was moved. The mover and seconder were Messrs. H. Wilcox and V. Gerratty, who, 26 years ago, when Mr. Massey was fighting his first and unsuccessful election, moved and seconded a similar motion in the same hall.

Speaking at Dixon t street last night, Mr. .T. Read, the Labour candidate for Wellington North, declared that the Liberal Party showed by its attitude during the present election that it was suffering from senile decay as a progrev sivc factor in the political Hfo of the community. It had been compelled to adopt the tactics of asking tho people to support it, beca-use of what its greatest leader had accomplished long ago, and to whose policy the Party had since become apostate. On the other hand, having no defined policy of their own, and no proper machinery such as the Labour Party had for defining its policy, the Liberals had descended to the point where they had to take portions of tho Labour platform to appeal to the public. The candidate thought that tho public were quite wise enough to recognise the camouflage, and he felt sure that the useful people would register a protest against such tactics on 17th December. He personally preferred a straight-out opponent such as those standing under the Tory banner, to those who professed to be friends merely because they imagined they could win by such tactics.

In his address to electors at Rosenoath last evening, Dr. Newman said he believed that all' branches of the Civil Service should be planed on the same footing, so that at times when bonuses or increases in salaries were proposed there would be no such difficulties as had arisen in connection with the reported promise of a bonus to the Post and Telegraph officers. He thought that to lower the cost of living it would be necessary to remove Customs duties on tho food of the people. Dr. Newman concluded by emphasising that he had always kept the pledges ho had made to the clcctora, mid that was the policy he ial_3_Aei_ j£ pursue,

In speaking on Labour troubles at Berhampore last evening, Mr. Dunbar Sloane urged upon his audience the importance of putting all workers on a. good footing, by the establishment of » sound superannuation scheme and national unemployment insurance schemes. "We must secure our workers," he-said, "against ojd age, unemployment, and illhealth. We must do away with the present system which affords such opportunities for the agitator and direct actionlst. The employer must 'toe the mark' as well as the employee, meet each other half way, and adjust differences. Let us be prepared for the new energy which invariably follows a. prolonged war, and apply it to our agricultural, industrial. and1 social life with justice to all."

'■Par from being disloyal and unpatriotic," said Mr. Semple in the course of his address on "The Tragedy of the Mines" at Brooklyn last evening, "so many of the'miners volunteered in. the early part of the war that Sir James Allen had to issue a proclamation forbidding miners to enlist, otherwise the industry would have been at'a standstill. Later a similar proclamation was issued to the quartz miners. And yet we are told that the miners were disloyal." He also referred to the excellent work done ■by. the Tunnelling Corps in France—miners all.

While referring to the dreadful ravages of miners' phthisis during his address at Brooklyn last evening, Mr. R-. Semple said that the average life of a miner was cut down by 20 years in New Zealand, and by no less than 27 years in the quartz mines of South Africa. In the latter mines a Kaffir as a rule could last out from fifteen to eighteen months underground, and a white man about three yen-rs, and death from miners' phthisis was a terrible and lingering death. He said that the provision rrfede for the relief of sickness of miners, at the rate of £1 per week, was shameful, and when the breadwinner had gone the wife had to struggle along with 12s 6d per week for,two years, and then the relief- ceased.

To-day the Civil servants.had superannuation, said Colonel Mitchell at Newtown last evening, but - why could not there be superannuation for all, something which could be claimed as of right by all in. the event of death,, sickness, or disablement, and not.as a charity. He believed charity was repugnant to all Britishers. (Applause.) He did not quarrel with superannuation for Public servants, but what he claimed was' that a similar system should apply to all the people. We were all servants of the State. Dealing with provision for widows and children, if it paid the State, ho said, to bring up fatherless children away from their mothers, surely it would pay the State better to grant the mothers such allowances as would enable thorn, to bring up their own children in their own homes and under a mother's influence. (Applause.)

"There are some people who imagine that the Labour Party comprises three poor men—Holland, Semple, and Fraser. You are asked to believe that. You are told that we are carrying the whole of the Labour Party on our backs. Why, it reminds me of a story of a small boy— a. story I heard to-day. . . . This small boy works upon a collier, and a little time ago he was asked to move a huge gangway. He looked at the mate and said : 'Do you know my name?' The mate said, 'Blank, isn't it.' The boy replied : 'You do know, then. You didn't think I was Samson.' Well, we must be three Samsons. To say that a trinity dominates the Labour Party is ridiculous, as anybody who studies its constitution must-realise. I have no more power in the Labour Party than any other member of the party."—Mr. P. Fraser at Aro-street Mission Hall, lastnight.