MAYOR HITS OUT

Evening Post, Volume CXXIX, Issue 31, 6 February 1940, Page 10

MAYOR HITS OUT

PACIFIST GROUP

"EMISSARIES OF SOVIET"

MEETINGS TO BE STOPPED

The activities of a certain group of people in New Zealand who he declared were carrying on subversive propaganda under the guise of so-called pacifist meetings were

castigated by the Mayor (Mr. T. C.

A.Hislop) when speaking in the Town Hall today at the first of a new series of recruiting rallies in the form of community sings. The Mayor said he would do all in his power to prevent those people conducting public meetings in Wellington, and added that during the great depression some of the people who were active today in the group, he referred to had spread propaganda as the direct

emissaries of Soviet Russia,

"Efforts are being made today in certain quarters to hinder the national effort," said Mr. Hislop. "I have seen them in actual reality and I know what their real object is. Only a few weeks ago I closed this Town Hall, as I will close it again if the effort is made to use it on behalf of a body of people who want to advocate that New Zealand should drop out of this war, that she should desert her comrades in arms and blood. (Applause.)

"Those people pretended they were going to discuss only principles of peace, and when it became known that I had refused to permit the hall to be made available I was telephoned by one of the body I have referred to, a Mr. Lan Milner, who expressed surprise at my action. I told him the best thing for him to do was to get into the front line, and not shelter behind the bodies of people better than himself.

"Some of those people whose careers I know, during the great depression when the feeling was ripe for the sowing of subversive doctrines in certain quarters, sowed them as the direct emissaries of Soviet Russia. Some of those people are in this movement today. Their real object is to endeavour to induce this country to withdraw from the war.

UNITED NATION NEEDED,

"It is the duty of the. men and women left in this country to go forward as a united nation in support of the cause, to which the Empire is committed if we are not to sink into oblivion.

"There are in this group to which I have referred several reverend gentlemen who I prefer to think are gravely deluded. I say to them, What do they think should be done about the killing and torturing of men, women, and children in Poland by the Germans who these so-called supporters of pacifism in this country are doing their best to help?

"I believe they talk of holding a meeting on that piece of Corporation land by the Royal Oak Hotel on Friday night. lam going to do my best to see that that meeting1 is not held. I don't mind what they do in other parts of New Zealand, but if they want a fight in Wellington, they can have it." (Prolonged applause.)

"Here we are in New Zealand five months after the outbreak of war, unable to make up the full strengths of the first few units of troops for service overseas," said the Mayor, after stating that the Second Echelon of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force now in camp was not yet up to full strength. The Mayor compared recruiting for the new war with the experience for the first two years of the last outbreak, when he said it was not a case of calling for men but of making a selection from those young men- who were eager to serve their country.

"HAVE TO FACE FACTS."

"We have to face facts," said Mr. Hislop. "The British people, the French people, and all who have built up their civilisations on Christian principles and the right of self-govern-ment and self-development are up against the greatest menace to their continued freedom in history—a foe that in its treatment of Austria, Czecho-Slovakia, and Poland has surpassed in brutality anything that has happened in the world before. If we don't win this war we, will be under the heel of that same tyrant and will suffer in the same way. If we don't come forward and take our share with those who are fighting our battles then we deserve whatever comes tojjis.

"This is a war that will determine whether we will survive and continue to enjoy the. freedom we have continued to enjoy throughout the. years, or whether those things will be swept away, leaving us to become the helots and the hewers of wood and drawers of. water for the Nazi despots.

"What little New Zealand can do may not determine the issue, but if New Zealand does not play her part to the full she will stand for ever disgraced for remaining shielded behind the bodies and the blood of the men and women and children, too, of Great Britain and France.

"We must get away from the complacency we have exhibited so far and remember what is the duty of every fit man;

"A POOR THING."

"Surely it is a poor thing that we have to go out in this way to call for the first few to make up our numbers, I hope that that is only due to the failure to realise the issues at stake.

"So I ask all of you who hear me to utilise every effort you can to make the true nature of this struggle known and also where the path of duty lies. I hope that as the knowledge of what we are facing spreads through the country, that the men will come forward in ever-increasing numbers, so that we can emulate the response made in 1914-18, when New Zealand sent more than 100,000 men overseas, and so that we can at last say New Zealand has played her part in this war to save civilisation as worthily as she did in the last."

A speech in support of the campaign was also made by the Deputy Mayor, Mr. M. F. Luckie, who said that New Zealand was certainly one of the prizes that would be demanded by Germany if she got into a position to impose her own peace terms. "We should be prepared to say that we will defend to the last man the civilisation England has bought and paid for for us," he said.

The song "Freedom's Army" was sung by a choir consisting of members of the Apollo Singers, conducted by Mr. H. Temple White, composer of the music, and a song and dance item was contributed by Miss Billie Pond. The song-leaders were Messrs. Gladstone Hill and Jack Morris. Miv Ernie Dean was at the piano.

There will be a similar rally and sing each day at 12.30 p.m,! until February 16.