VIEWS ON ELECTION

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 126, 23 November 1935, Page 13

VIEWS ON ELECTION

DEFECTS OF PARTY SYSTEM

The National Council of the New Zealand Legion has issued a statement regarding the attitude of the Legion towards the forthcoming election: —

The situation seemed, said the statement, to be developing exactly along the lines forecast by Dr. R. Campbell Begg in the early days of the Legion. After the election, we might find representatives of four or five parties in the House, none of whom could command an absolute majority, and the Government would have, to be carried on by tentative agreement between groups which had no common policy. The Legion had hoped to be able to co-ordinate the effort of a group of Independents—men and women of true independent thought who wished to put an end to the party system. Such a group would have subscribed to and worked for the three principal objectives adopted by the Legion, namely, reform of local body government, the establishment of an economic council, and the introduction of preferential voting.

Too many people today failed to realise that under the present system, there was little they could achieve. That realisation would come, but it was evident that it would come only through hard experience.

It seemed likely that recent developments would exaggerate the evils of the party system, which will be more pronounced than they have been previously whilst the party in power had a clear majority. The new House might give such a demonstration of the failure of the party system as would persuade the electors that they should take the course advocated by the Legion and make it impossible for that system to function within the House.