PARTY POLITICS

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 100, 30 April 1938, Page 7

PARTY POLITICS

Dealing with the Citizens' criticism of the Labour candidates that they are bound by party politics, Mr. P. M. Butler, candidate for the City Council, said that the majority of his opponents on the Citizens' ticket had either held political posts with more or less success, or had attempted to ■ do so, while Mr. Hislop himself had the political octopus clamp put upon him when he attempted to force himself into political leadership. If all the fifteen Citizens' candidates were ranged on the platform wearing their one (or several) political party banners, they would look like a rainbow without its rosy blush. They had allbeen through a political paint shop, "Liberal," "National," "United," "Reform," ' "Coalition," and "Nationalist,", and in dvic matters they had paraded as "Civic Leaguers," "Citizens' Leaguers," "Ratepayers," and "Citizens' Ticketeers." The name was immaterial to them, so long as they opposed the progressive policy of Labour. The truth was, that after many years of striving, the Labour Party had been entrusted with the Government of the country, and had made a success of the job. The "Citizens'" .candidates realised1 this, and 'knew that a Labour Council would be as successful in civic affairs as a Labour Government was in national affairs. The "Citizens'" candidates had improperly assumed, a name, and were crying "politics" to mislead .the electors. Even children attending primary schools knew that the rights and powers of civic authority were evolved from the clash of political interests, and that long before the Labour Party was born of the struggle, Whigs and Tories, Liberals and Conservatives, fought out the issue of right versus wrong in local body elections, as well as in national elections.