BANNED BOOKS

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 86, 8 October 1930, Page 10

BANNED BOOKS

SIR. HOLLAND PROTESTS

MINISTER QUOTES TITLES

Vov several years past the Customs Department has had passed a vote of £100 as payment for services '<5f the chairman and members of the Advisory Committee on Literature, which censors-the literature imported into the Dominion. In reply to questions by the Leader of tho Labour Party (Mr. H. E. Holland) and Mr. W. Nash (Labour, Hutt) in the House of Representatives early this morning, the Minister of Customs (the Hon. J. G. Cobbe) said.that the books prohibited at the present time were those that encouraged lawlessness or were indecent. Unfortunately, the committee, which consisted of Messrs. Charles Wilson, Bain, and South, did not always agree, and on one occasion the- Minister himself had stopped the importation of an indecent book, and in another case, he had stopped an indecent picture. The object of the committee was to prevent obscene books from getting into the hands of young people. The Leader of the Labour Party (Mr. H. E. Holland) asked whether the censorship extended to historical and scientific literature. From time to _ timo books which were wholly historical in value had been banned, and he had some of these books on Ms own shelves. He would not walk across tho road to lift the censorship on indecent books, but he was concerned with historical and scientific literature. If members of the House were allowed to read this literature, the general public were entitled to read it. The Minister said that he would be pleased to allow the Leader of the Labour Party to see the list of banned books, and he commenced to read typical books—"The Programme of the Communist Party." Mr. Holland: "Is that on* the list? Good heavens!" Mr. Cobbe: "Defence of Terrorism." Mr. Holland: "Trotsky's 'Defence of Terrorism' —I' have that on my shelves, and I invite the Department to prosecute me." Mr. Holland said that it was absurd that the board should be holding up this, literature. How could he oppose the ideas contained in these books unless he had opportunities to read them. Ho could show the Minister books on the.shelves of the Parliamentary Library that wore not vastly different from the banned publications. It was time that the Government got rid of its incompetent, hopeless, and inept censors. Any student of current history and polities had read these books.