ABOUT HERSELF

Grey River Argus, 4 August 1925, Page 7

ABOUT HERSELF

ELLEN WILKINSON, M.P, Miss Wilkinson is the first Wesleyan woman to enter the House of Commons, Interviewed by tho “Methodist Times’’ she said: “I am a keen Socialist, and strongly 6f tho Left Wing, as it is called. 1 want to see a drastic re-organisation of society. lam not i.i the least either afraid or ashamed of the name or word Socialist—it is so silly of the capitalist press' to think we are, or that it does ns harm—it does not. “I believe that it is the duty of the Labour Party’, as some prefer to caii it, to appeal to all those w'io are unhappy and discontented under this cruel and chaotic system of private ownership of what ought to be publicly owned services, and to prepare them for the coming change. “We must do away with the lingering tradition that this present system is of divine ordaining—it is not. It is just the unfortunate but inevitable result of our industrial system. “I want there to be no millionaires and no paupers. It is to me often a cause of great amusement that the Tory press, and indeed multitudes of quite intelligent and religious people, think and proclaim that any form of national ownership would mean that individuals would own nothing—and also that all sorts of inconceivable horrors—they hint at free love, whatever that may mean—-would result from the State taking - over the great services! What utter nonsense.’’