MR. SEMPLE’S LANGUAGE

Greymouth Evening Star, 6 September 1938, Page 2

MR. SEMPLE’S LANGUAGE

RIVERS BOARD PROTEST. [PER PRESS ASSOCIATION.] NAPIER, September 5. “There is neither justification nor need for that outburst. It is just one of those outbursts we have come to expect from that Minister. It seems to me that thinking in millions has swollen the Minister’s head.” said Mr. W. H. Campbell, a member of the Hawke’s Bay Rivers Board, during a discussion at a board meeting to-day of a recent remark made at Clive by the Minister for Public Works (Hon. R. Semple) that the board had “mucked up its river protection works.” The chairman, Mr. Lassen, said that he regretted that the Minister had made the statement, particularly as it had been published throughout New Zealand. “It is difficult to understand the Minister’s remarks to Ciive residents,” Mr. Lassen said. “If he means that the works had been inefficiently carried on then the board definitely denies that that is the case. I cannot see that the works were ‘mucked up,’ and think the Minister's remarks were uncalled for.” Mr. R. E. Talbot said that it had been the Minister who had mucked the board up. “When we have a Minister coming to the district and upsetting the ratepayers I think it is time we dug in our heels and perhaps used some of the language that he uses sometimes."