ATTACKING INDIVIDUALS.

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 68, 21 March 1931, Page 8

ATTACKING INDIVIDUALS.

Skirmishes which havo taken place between tho Independent member for Stratford (Mr. AY. J. Poison) and members of the Labour Party were again referred to in the House of Representatives this morning. Mr. Poison declared that if he had had a party behind him, and were not merely an individual in the House, the Labour Party would not have made the personal attacks on him they had made. Mr. Parry: "You keep your tongue off us." Mr. Speaker: "Order! Order!" Mr. Poison: "I notice the Labour Party prefers to attack individuals and not parties " "I»o you want a handkerchief?" inquired a Labour member. Mr. Poison, replying to Labour criticism, said that no member of the farmin? community had fought harder for lower interest rates for tho farmer than he had. The only alternatives before the country were the reducing of costs or tho increasing of taxation. The country could not stand an increase in taxation, and therefore the other method had to bo adopted, distasteful though it might be. Provided tho real wages of the workers were not affected, and he believed they would not lie, they would bo better off under tho present proposals. Mr. P. Fraser (Labour, Wellington Central) dealt vigorously with references made by Mr. Poison to the member for Raglan, and to the attitude he adopted towards criticism of his speeches. "Apparently the member for Stratfo:.'d," said Mr. Fraser, "is accustomed to speaking in small corners where people gaze in open-mouthed wonder at the oracle laying down the law, and where no one dares contradict Sir Oracle." The Labour Party, added Mr. Fraser, had no complains to make about Mr. Poison's attacks on it. Mr. Parry: "There is nothing in them!" Mr. Eraser: "Quite so. Ho accuses us of all sorts of 'terrible crimes,' but when we reply to his charges, he gets up like a schoolboy and whines about Mr. Speaker: "Order! Order!"