IS IT THE TRUTH ?

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVIII, Issue 10739, 9 November 1928, Page 6

IS IT THE TRUTH ?

>' j. (To the Editor.) __ ' cjir.—Epeaking in the New Centura- Hall on October 30, • 1928. Mr. T» Vfracer said what they wanted was ani'intellectiial contest. W«T. there can' be ; no intellectual di*oussion vntbouf' regard for the facto, and the question we now raise is whether this candidate : Had any real. concern forth© facto in a-statement, he .made at that-meeting: . . ■ Mr. Fraser went on to reiterate that many immigrants (jy a ippuetl by Jhe Govern-

ment and bearing the title “New Zealand, Brighter Britain of the South,’.’ which he avered, stated that “jf 3 average working man’s wage was i 7 xl r S , a v-eek.” We challenge the truthfulness of that statement of his tor the, reason that the booklet does not say any such' thing. On page 28 of the booklet, the following are set out as. award rates of pay: Bakers (journeymen) 97s 6d Tier week. ' 1 : Boilermakers, 2s 2d per hour. Boot' operatives (male), Is lUd per hour. laborers - Is 9d and Is lvfd per hour. Bricklayers, 2s 3d and 2s 33d ner hour. ‘ There are a number of others, but the last is the highest in the list presented. Mr. Fraser cannot deny the correctness of this statement. What then are we to think of a man who can stand on a public nlatform and say “this booklet states' the average working man’s wage in -New Zealand is £7 10s a week.”

If lie read the booklet through, as we assume he must have done, then lie told his audiences what' he knows |s contradicted by positive evidence n (he booklet itself. On the rates of paj set out on page 28 the workers could not earn anything like £7 10s a week. This is a glaring instance of misrepresentation .and we find the same falsehood is being circulated by other of the party’s candidates over the Dominion. It is a falsehood to say . the booklet gives £7 10s a week,' as the wage of the average working man in New Zealand when in point of fact cue page we here quote contradicts any such idea. Mr. Fraser, and others of the .party, may try and excuse themselves by saying there is another passage in the booklet which, seems to say the average working man earns £7 10s to £ll 10s a week. Such an explanation is a miserable shuffle. To rest on an inference which is only supposition and hid out of sight the positive evidence of page 28 we have quoted shows plainly what regard for fact Mr. Fraser has. Hero is the passage that he and his colleagues are using as a trick --ard with which to deceive the electors. It is on page 39 and reads thus: “In New Zealand the average working man with a family of three and an income up to £7 10s a week would pa v no income tax at all, and 'css than £4 per annum with an in:omj up to £ll 10s a week.” They read that as saying the average working man has a wage of £7 19s to £ll 10s a week. Such reading is absurd. They might as well rend it, that the average working man has three of a family. It does not say so; neither does it say what wage the average working man has. The passage may he loosely constructed but their inference is much h-oscr. Take their own interpretation, which, of course, is free from air political, bias, an:l w.rat does it ►-.mount to? That the paragraph suggests by innuendo that the average working man earns from £7 MF io £ll 10s.

So Mr. Fraser and others of his party seek to foist , that, far fetched interpretation on their audiences in fp.ee of the fact that page 28 of the booklet proves it untrue. They hav-' done more than that for they have kept hidden the information given, on page 28 and presented their interpretation of the passage on page 39 as what the booklet says. . This is not a question of Reform, limited or Labor, it "is a much broader issue. The question is one of honesty and truthfulness ini politics. We invite Mr. Fraser or any of his party’s candidates to justify theii action in this matter —We arc yours, ° C ‘’ N.Z. WELFARE LEAGUE.