STATUS DEFINED

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21900, 19 December 1945, Page 6

STATUS DEFINED

CHAMBERS' REPLY TARANAKI CHARGES RECENT LEGISLATION (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Dec. 19. “The report from New Plymouth of the suggested boycott of firms who leave the Bank of New Zealand displays an ignorance by the Taranaki Trades Council of the functions of the Chambers of Commerce organisations that is only equalled by its lack of logic,” said the Associated Chambers of Commerce in a statement yesterday. “It seeks to fasten the same narrow party political conceptions on the Chambers of Commerce which it freely confesses to be its own stock-in-trade.” “While asserting that the Chamber of Commerce is a ‘vicious subsidiary of the National Party’, it calls on, amongst others, ‘Government supporters,’ to ‘place their orders with firms who did not mix business with politics.’ Its assertion is.wholly false. It should know it to be false, for the aims and objects of the Chambers of Commerce have been publicly proclaimed often enough. “On the other hand, its appeal to ‘Government supporters’ proclaims that it is purely a Labour Party organisation designed to serve sectional interests and to instigate class war. Interest in Politics “The Chambers of Commerce have never denied their interest in politics. They are forced to be political in the widest sense, because politicians and political organisations insist on making politics out of business. If the commercial interests of the nation and

the well-being of the people are to be properly served, it is essential that the chambers —with their special business qualifications—take an active part in discussions on political questions—to praise, advise, or to warn regardless of what political party is in power. “The Chambers of Commerce belong to no political party. It is impossible that they should, because their membership comprises supporters of all parties and of no party. The only thing that counts is the effect a proposed measure is likely to have on the nation as a whole, uot any particular section of it. Former Public Statements

“There has been ample evidence of this in the innumerable public statements issued by the Associated Chambers of Commerce of New Zealand for years prior to the Labour Party becoming the Government and since. Whatever opposision to the present Government has come from the Chambers of Commerce has been due to the Government’s determination to destroy completely that individuality and initiative which, combined with free enterprise, were responsible for raising New Zealand to an honoured place in the world and to replace that sound system by socialism, which aims to regiment the people into being State employees.”