The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1928. SIR JOSEPH WARD.

Evening Star, Issue 19999, 17 October 1928, Page 6

The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1928. SIR JOSEPH WARD.

lx Auckland the country seats are a stronghold of Reform and the city seats of Labour. Therefore there is great significance in the remarkable success of Sir Joseph Ward in the northern city last night. The Town Hall wan altogether too small to hold those who wished to hear the United Party’s newly-chosen leader disclose its policy. The sympathetic attention during the speech and the notable demonstration at its conclusion flatly contradict the fallacy which both the other parties have been pattering until they have nearly convinced themselves that it must be true—viz., that Liberalism is moribund, if not already dead. For early in his speech Sir Joseph Ward proclaimed “ I am a, Liberal,” and a great burst of applause rent the roof, showing that many cf the electors have retained their old convictions and their old enthusiasm. It only needed a man like Sir Joseph, a man with a record of political achievement and with a strong personality, to bring all this to the surface. Sir ridicules the idea that ins ago is any handicap in the matter of leadership. Ho does not attempt to divert attention from the fact that it is over forty years since ho entered Parliament. Rather he emphasised it by reminding his audience that he was a contemporary of Sir George Grey in the House iulBS7. The name recalls the stirring political events of those days and provokes a contrast with the drab doings of Parliament to-day. The Prime Minister has virtually admitted that since last election the Government has really done next to nothing; but ho actually seeks to justify it on the ground that he had not promised to do anything! Sir Joseph Ward, on the contrary, declares that there is a great deal to be done. His policy programme has been awaited with some impatience and more curiosity. Now that it has been disclosed tbo effect is somewhat staggering. No such ambitious scheme has been placed before the country for many years. Sir Joseph was always an optimist and a firm believer in New Zealand. He is impatient of the tendency to mark time, of the interminable spinning out of various public works, of the apathy in respect of land settlement which has actually produced slight but perceptible movement in the reverse direction i. 0., towards rcaggregation. So acquiescent has a section of the people become under the regime of laissez laire—-euphemis-tically called “getting things done” —that Sir Joseph Ward’s bold proposals may strike many as going to the other extreme, and a few of them may remark that Sir Joseph Ward was always a. plunger. But he considers the dominion lo ho under-capitalised. If there is to bo an expansion of business more capital will have to be called up, and Sir Joseph says he knows how readily it could ho obtained. During bis recent travels bo has seen development in Canada and other places, and their business-like methods of pushing projects to rapid completion contrasts vividly with our own Government’s dawdling piecemeal ways. There appears to bo an impression abroad that a revival of the United Party will merely mean the splitting of votes with Reform and the enthronement of Labour. Undoubtedly there does exist that possibility. However, if that is all the argument the Reform Party can urge for its continuance in power for another term its intrinsic poverty of men and ideas stands exposed. The fault really lies with our electoral law-and its antiquated first-past-the-post system. Sir Joseph himself introduced the second ballot, and his successors in office promptly repealed it. Should the present Government inherit tbo fruits of that action there would be au element of poetic justice in it. There were undoubtedly abuses liable to attach to the second ballot, and'Sir Joseph now expresses a leaning to a system of preferential voting. Meantime the next election at least must be contested in primitive style. It is to bo hoped that Sir Joseph Ward will follow up his success at Auckland with others in different parts of the dominion, for his exhilarating influence on a lately rather dispirited Liberalism is incontestable.