POLITICAL FIELD

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 120, 23 May 1941, Page 9

POLITICAL FIELD

WOMEN CANDIDATES

NATIONAL PARTY DISCUSSION

CASE PUT FORWARD

A remit from the Auckland Division, requesting the leader and the party to further the interests of women candidates, at the Dominion conference of the National Party today, resulted in an interesting discussion. Women delegates took the principal part, and were warmly applauded for their contributions.

Dr. Hilda Northcroft," of Auckland, said women in New Zealand received the vote earlier than elsewhere, but New Zealand was now behind the times as far as women's representation was concerned. It frequently happened that although women were often elected on local bodies, the tendency was to reject them when they submitted themselves for selection as Parliamentary candidates. The one Labour candidate successful at the recent Auckland City Council election had been a woman, and she succeeded just because she was a woman. (Laughter.)

Mrs. J. Kealy, of Auckland, said one of the principal arguments in favour of selecting women candidates at the present time was the part they were playing in the war effort.

. Mr. J. Park, Mayor of Onehunga, who supported the remit, said that men in public life looked to their wives for assistance, but if women were elected, the husbands would have to help their wives. (Laughter.) There were women in New Zealand who not only thought and expressed themselves clearly, but gave indications of a progressive spirit that the men might well emulate.

Mrs. N. A. R. Barrer, of Masterton, said the laws were made by men for men, and the world was ruled by men for men, and a pretty mess they had made of it. No country would ever go forward to a great future unless it gave women a chance to shape its destinies.

The remit was carried unanimously after Mrs. R. Miller and Mrs. E. M. Gould had also spoken.