POLITICAL ADDRESSES

Grey River Argus, 15 February 1941, Page 10

POLITICAL ADDRESSES

OVER THE AIR During War Crisis OPPOSITION LEADER’S DEFENCE. [Per Press Association] CHRISTCHURCH, February 14. “It is bad enough having only one side'told over the air, yet now it ap pears that the Prime Minister <Rt. Hon. P. Fraser) wants the same con ditions for public speaking, ■Leader of the Opposition (Mr S GHolland) said yesterday io lhe Press” in an interview in which he replied to a criticism of his action in conducting a North Island touu Mr Fraser gave his interview to the Labour Party’s official organ in WelThe Prime Minister’s statement was: “I have noted with little interest Mr Holland’s political campaign, and I have been much too busy in connexion with war work to give any detailed attention to his remarks, which are usually self-condemnatory. From my cursory glance at them, I would say that it would be extremely difficult to find in them anything helpful in the present crisis, when the threat of invasion to Britain and possible rapid and dangetous developments in the Pacific render ordinary politics insignificant. “As far as the masses of the people are concerned the most conspicuous, effect will be endorsement by Mr Holland’s statements Of the Government’s contention that if the National Party were returned to power the gains in social and economic advancement would be lost to them. The immediate effect of Mr Holland’s campaign on the Labour Party is the closing of ranks in a nationwide unity and renewed determination to retain the social and economic advances achieved by the Labour Government for the mass of the people while at the same time straining every nerve and sinew to work for the country’s war effort.” Mr Holland said there was not the slightest need for the Prime Minister to explain that he had not given detailed attention to what he had been saying on his recent North Island tour. That was obvious trom Mr Fraser’s criticism. It was always difficult to criticise when one was unaware of what one was criticising. “Mr Fraser seems in some difficulty in understanding the need for such a tour as I have just concluded, and 1 am only too pleased to explain,” the Leader of the Opposition said. “First of all, the Prime Minister will recall that the Government refuses Opposition speakers the use of the broad-i casting services, so of necessity my colleagues and I have to use the public platform and the newspapers for presenting our side of the case—and there are two side? of every story. As the Prime Minister has been too busy to give more tnan a cursory glance ■it my comments, it may be of some interest to nim to know one or two things I have said. "First, that it is absurd to have some 29,000 men on public works and relief schemes in these times. Second, that it is a shame that New Zealand soldiers overseas cannot have their own money sent from New Zealand to them in excess of Is 6d a day while Australian soldieis can get f 6 a week. Third, that by not following Britain’s example in forming a national government, it is the Government, and not the Opposition, which is making political activity necessary.

If Mr Fraser was upset because he had addressed meetings of friends and supporters of the National Party, said Mr Holland, he wondered how the Prime Minister felt when he reminded him that his Deputy-Prime Minister (the Hon. W. Nash) was addressing a public meeting in Dunedin at the very time that he (Mr Holland) was speaking in Taranaki. It would be cruel to remind Mr Frased of the many meetings of the Labour Party addressed by the Prime Minister himself, the Minister for Railways (Hon. R. Semple) and Mr Nash, to say nothing of the Hon. P. C. Webb’s notorious ‘Julius Caesar' speech at Denniston. "Apparently, the Prime Minister considers it quite all right for his side to address meetings everywhere but quite wrong for the other side to do the same,’’ concluded Mr Holland.

Prime Minister’s Offer

TO OPPOSITION SPEAKERS. WELLINGTON, February 14. The Prime Minister replied to-day to the recent references by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr S. G. Holland), to the use of broadcasting services. Mr Fraser said: “There has been no use made of the broadcasting services for political addresses since the termination of the last session of parliament. “The recent important address of the Minister of Finance, in Dunedin, was not on the air,” said Mr Fraser. Mr Fraser continued that he would be very pleased to arrange lor Mr Holland, as the Leader of the Opposition, to deliver over the national radio service an address, or addresses, over a reasonable period, like his predecessor did some time ago, in support of the war effoit; and later on, said Mr Fraser, when political controversy was unavoidable, and was more opportune than it was during the present acute crisis, the Leader and the members of the Opposition would have an ample and an equitable opportunity of using the broadcasting system for the airing of their views.

“In fact," added Mr Fraser, “there is a great and a potent benefit in encouraging them to do so.”