The Evening Star FRIDAY, APRIL 18, 1941. CLOSE THE RANKS.

Evening Star, Issue 23863, 18 April 1941, Page 4

The Evening Star FRIDAY, APRIL 18, 1941. CLOSE THE RANKS.

Of the National Party’s latest offer to co-operate with the Gioverninent in a National Ministry the first thing to be said is that it is a pity that the offer was not made in its present form a month earlier. Previous emphasis of Mr Holland was laid on a suggestion that the elections should be held as usual, but that an agreement should be first made between the parties that whichever of them might be returned at the polls should make it its first act to effect a combination. What is proposed now is that a National Government should be formed at once, since “ the entire sinking of party politics and the cessation of the otherwise inevitable campaigning ” are included among the proposal’s advantages. That is the way the thing should bo done—the sooner the better —but the present moment, when the Prime Minister is preparing for a visit to London, offers peculiar difficulties for its consummation. The most Mr Fraser could promise in those circumstances, after consulting the annual party conference which gives its sailing directions to each Labour Government, was that the proposal would be carefully considered by him in conjunction with his colleagues immediately on his return. He repeated an invitation to Mr Holland to join the War Cabinet, which would not meet the end required, ami expressed his hopes that during his absence from the Dominion a party truce, to be made as effective as possible, might be 'arranged. The public hears little of the War Cabinet, though it has heard that it is working well. Something more than that is needed—a National Government —so that the country may feel its unity and may be saved from all manner of distractions in its conduct of a struggle which is literally one of life or death. Besides making fetishes of divisions, party politics confuses the focus in which present needs should be viewed. That effect was visible in the Labour Conference’s extreme emphasis —corrected by the Prime Minister—on conserving living standards at a time when sacrifice should be the first call. It was visible in Mr Nash’s boasting—for tho satisfaction of the Federation of Labour—that this Dominion’s economy is now under the control of tho Government to a greater degree than in any other country, and his citation of companies which—triumphant effect of the conscription of wealth—paid more in taxation and compulsory war loan than their profits for the year. That may easily have been done at the expense of comparatively poor shareholders, and if the process was repeated often enough it would he bad for New Zealand*as well as for them. A wrong focus was displayed by the magnanimous recommendation of the Labour Conference that every effort bo made to induce doctors to co-operate on a voluntary basis “ before any compulsion was resorted to.” It is not doctors who need to be fought in the present crisis.

Some sacrifices by botli sides are inevitable in the formation of a National Government. The Opposition might not get all the seats it could desire. Some Ministers would need to retire from the present Ministry. The need for retirements did not prove prohibitive of union when Mr Massey set his example during the last war. Mr Churchill did not count seats in making his allocations to a National Government. But a minority representation for one party should not be insupportable if party issues are to remain in abeyance, as they should do, during the Avar. They can do so more easily, one might judge, from Labour’s viewpoint in the light of Mr Nash’s boasts of what has been already achieved. Mr Coates put the issue fairly when he said a few months ago: “ We are engaged in a war, but hot to make profits. We are not so concerned about wages. We are not concerned about politics. lam not so very concerned about the standard of living, but wbat I am concerned about, and what, I think, every member of this House and every citizen has to be concerned about, is our very life and existence.” A first object of both now should be to get rid of distractions.