GENERAL ELECTION

Gisborne Times, Volume LI, Issue 5343, 2 December 1919, Page 5

GENERAL ELECTION

PREPARATION OF THE ROLLS.

THE QUESTION OF REMOVAL OF NAMES.

THE REGISTRAR’S DISCRETION

Oil the Gisborne electoral roll ■fcneie are 11,/00 names, the main roll comprising 9581, and the supplementary 2,119. Mr. H. E. Hill, registrar of electors, stated to a Times reporter yesterday that from this total, however, there had to he deducted, for deaths, removals and other causes, 537 names, which left an effective roll of 11,163 names. Dealing with objections, Mr. Hill stated that these had in a number of cases been sent out to the addresses given, and intimating that seven to ten days would be given in which to appeal against removal from the rolls. The names, he said would not be struck off on the grounds of removal, until the notices of objections were returned to him through the Dead Letter Office. In many cases in which there wa s a doubt as to whether persons were in the district, the letters reached their destinations, but the persons concerned did not reply. If the letters were not returned it was assumed that the letters had reached their destinations, and the names were left upon the roll. The removal of names was left to the discretion oi the registrar, and if. such names as the above were removed, there was likely to be trouble. The registrar had discretionary powers, and when objections were lodged by electors, notices were sent out. but there had to be a fair amount of give and take in such districts as this with irregular mail services. After the election was over he would have to go carefully through the rolls and check the list of objections with the roll, and see who had voted and who had not voted. This was not like a city electorate. A list of names to which objection had been made was kept by him for the purpose of checking. In a number of the cases of objections which came in, there were some names which had been transferred to other districts, and in these cases a transfer card was received in due course by the registrar. Then the names were taken off, hut the cards showing authority for removal were kept by the registrar to show why the names were taken off. The I above conditions amounted to personal knowledge by the registrar, and only in such cases were names removed. _ Mr. Hill stated that people had no idea of the vast amount of work which was entailed in the alteration of the rolls. The preparation of an electoral roll was no sinecure. A house-to-house canvass of the people in the district had been made by the postal officials, to see who was on the roll, as a great number, according to the last electoral roll, had left their addresses and left no other addresses. The Department had instructed that these names should not be removed, but that an asterisk should be placed alongside them in the rolls to be used by the deputy returning officers at the various polls. Such persons who do vote will then be asked for their addresses. Instructions had also ' been given that all those names marked “gone, no address,” and who did not vote at the last licensing poll should not he removed. Objections would be sent out v these names to test whether they were still in the district, and the names would not be removed until after the election. The supplementary roll will he m the hands of the registrar this week. :

SOLDIERS IN HOSPITAL

ARRANGEMENTS FOR IHELR VOTES.

Mr Hill states that he had received instructions that any soldiers lying in bed in a military hospital and unable to go to the poll, could record their votes in a ballot box to be taken to the bedside, after first obtaining the medical officer’s permission. Mr. Hill has made arrangements for the secretary of the Cook Hospital Board to act os ' puty returning officer, and any soldier lving in bed can obtain his vote. This will be the procedure throughout New Zealand. Mr. Hill also states that any soldier who is on a roll, for instance the Gisborne roll, and who happens to be in Wellington at the time of the election may vote without an absent voter’s permit, and in this way he is given a concession ever the ordinary elector.

CLOSING OF NOMINATIONS

LAST DAY—MONDAY NEXT

Nominations of candidates for the elections will close at noon on Monday, December 8.

THE LABOR CANDIDATE.

CAMPAIGN OPENS THIS EVENING.

The Labor candidate for the Gisborne seat, Mr T. Brindle, yesterday held a meeting with the watersiders. Last evening there was a meeting with delegates of the Labor Representation Lommittee and the election committee. Mr / Brindle will open his campaign this evening at a meeting in His Majesty's Theatre.

HON W. D. S. MacDONALD AT TARUHERU FREEZING WORKS.

Yesterday the Hon. W. D. S MacDonald addressed a number at the workmen of the Taruheru freezing works during the luncheon inteival. Mr MacDonald was accorded a good hearing and a vote of thanks and confidence in the speaker vas carried unanimously, and cheers were given for thfte a ”ef for Tok9maru Bay, where he speaks this evening.

BAY OP PLENTY ROLL.

1500 NAMES NOT TO BE STRUCK

With reference to the 1500 names which it was stated had been struck off the Bay of Plenty roll, the Hon. W.-D £ MacDonald has been mformed that thev will not now be struck on. lhe 1500 names cover the who e Plenty electorate, and not the Gisoorne sub-division alone.

SIR JAMES CARROIH/S CANDIDA-

meeting on campaign , sa + ion _ A sising the necessity for organisatio committee was set .• ts Whataupoko and snb-districts.

A. DISORDERLY MEETING.

MOTION OP NO-CONFIDENCE IN mu CHAIRMAN.

INTERRUPTER PUSHED OFF THE 11 PLATFORM.

Press The Town Hall at South Dunedin-was Or. M. Bradley, was carried the # Labo S r party Thfmove? of the motion TheM S ,S"i f S°disorder, amidst LVXu fan -hour “tow deavored to make himself the hooting and bawling, and eventu ally stated 5 that he had no alternative • but to declare the meeting. closed and in doing so, he expressed the hope that

they would he British enough to sing the National Anthem. Whether in the uproar the chairman's request was heard or not may be doubtful. It is certain however, that this was the signal for renewed hooting and general disorder, amidst which the meeting j broke up.

MR GRAIGIE WANTS A -FREE

HAND

COUNTRY TIRED OF THE PARTY

SYSTEM.

Press Association Telegram. ~ T . TIMARU7 Dec. 1. mr J. Graigie, M.P., addressing his supporters to-night, said the country was tired of the party system, under which principles were sacrificed for personal ambitions. He asked for a free hand, and to be sent to the House untrammelled and unfettered, to enable him to dp his best for the Dominion, the meeting unanimously approved of aL-P 0 , as outlined and endorsed his attitude.

THE LABOR OLIGARCHY

“A REAL NATIONAL PERIL.”

A Wellington Post correspondent writes:—- On a recent Sunday night, being at a loose end, I strolled to the great Labor rally at the Artcraft Thea - Ii . r ®h> t° my unsophisticated mind, it seemed to bo simply one continual stream of epithets hurled at all and sundry, more especially at the two poor unfortunates—as they termed the press and the capitalist—against both of whom they were conducting a real cunkum. hate campaign. There were, .J, remember rightly, six of these epithet-hurlers, nad no sooner had one speaker exhausted liis vocabulary than he was succeeded by another who seemed only too anxious to hurl his around. And so they went on for one and ahalf hours. . . If the present Labor Party gains political power, it will hr tlie end of democratic government in this country. It would be ruled by an oligarchy, for the Political Labor Party is nothing more or less than an oligarchy in its form. This oligarchy is weilding power in New Zealand, because the laboring man, having no set opinions of his own, is willing to accept the ready-made article of the Extremist. This, to my mind, constitutes a real national peril, and it is the plain duty of every citizen to do his best to combat it.”

REFUSAL OF A BRIBE

SENSATIONAL STATEMENT BY A CANDIDATE.

During the course of a political address at Hamilton Mr Young, M.P.. stated that he was recently offered a bribe of £I,OOO if he used his influence to induce the Government to purchase a certain property for soldiers’ settlement at the owner’s price. A Voice: Why did you not put him up ? Mr Young added that the offer was made in writing by a friend of the owners. The speaker immediate! v sent for the owner, and told him the first thing he would now have to do would be to reduce the price by a full £I,OOO, and that the Government would have to make searching inquiry into the actual value of the land. He regarded the offer as an absolute insult, for it meant that the soldier boys would have to pay the bribe. He refused to associate himself with such bribery. (Loud applause.) The speaker said that during his term of office he had many tempting offers of tit-bits, but refused them all. He could defy any man to point a finger at him and say he had not done the straight manly thing while he had been in Parliament. (Prolonged applause.)

RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH

EXTREME LABOR ’ ACVICS. SYSTEMATIC INTER u U I.' lON

The supporters of the Labor candidates in Wellington are going to quite extraordinary lengths in preventing any of the opposing candid ares nom getting a hearing at meetings which they have held. '• Le 1 e tac tics are not new. They did it in 1911 and again with greater success in 1914, hut this year they are doing the thing even more thoroughly. Not any of the candidates opposed to 'extreme Labor has had a real hearing. The spirit that was present in the 1911 elections and in the 1914 fight is not being shown by those people in the audiences who do not support Labor. In previous fights there have been counter demonstrations against the disturbers of meetings, but nothing ot the sort is being attempted n,ow. Often it happens that the Labor supporters are deserting their own candidates in order to spoil the meeting of an opponent. _ For instance, when Mr P. Eraser, in Wellington Central, addressed an audience or only 40 people, Mr Piram s meeting in the same constituency was packed with supporters of the extremists. Many of them are men who make a practice of going to as many meetings as possible, shouting offensive remarks to the speakers, and generally taking charge of the proceedings. The Labor people are certainly denying the right of free speech to their opponents.

PARTY OBSESSION

LIBERALS SHUT THEIR EYES TO THE NEW LIGHT.

Though the old party issues are dead beyond recall, party spirit is still a force to be reckoned with. Hence the following comments by the Evening p os t —The refreshing exuberance with which the New Zealand Times denies the first of these propositions affords a convincing proof that the second is beyond dispute. Though the old issues are dead, the party spirit which is vainly endeavouring to revive them, and to press the new issues of to-day into the same service, is a living force which it would he absurd to ignore. The old faith shines from the columns of our contemporary as fiercely as ever, though perhaps not without a suspicion that there is less spontaneity and more conscious effort in the bellows work which keeps the home fires of Liberalism burning than in those good old days which it. is so anxious to restore. But in the main the old faith struggles admirably against the handicap of new conditions. It is anxious to show that it stands exactly where it did six years ago, that the greatest of all wars and a peace which threatens "still more fundamental changes in government and society have left it quite unchanged, that as the result of this world-shaking experience it has learned nothing and forgotten nothing; and it has perhaps come as near to success as was humanly possible in the uphill task. Our contemporary is to be congratulated upon the gallantry with which it shuts its eyes to the new light, and stops its ears to the call of the new conditions, and upon the simple faith which glories in this triumph of an antediluvian Conservatism as the very latest word in the only up-to-date Liberalism of the hour.