LABOUR PARTY

Grey River Argus, 13 September 1946, Page 7

LABOUR PARTY

Grey Election Committee CANVASSING AREAS. As the result of a meeting of the Greymouth Labour Party Election Committee, held recently in Greymouth, an extensive house-to-house canvass is at present in operation throughout the town. Primarily, the purpose of the canvass is to determine the number of persons who are not on the national roll which is expected to be published in about a fortnight’s time. Those people who are not already on the roll —especially those who have attained the age of 21 years since the last election, and have been indifferent to voting—,will, after the completion of the canvass, be placed on a supplementary roll.

Present at the meeting were Miss Mary Anderson, M.L.C., Mesdames Williams, Green, Pfahlert, Baker. Erskine, Hornsby, Burley, Caldwell, and Miss K. Spencer, Messrs WGreen (chairman of the L.R.C.), P. Blanchfield, T. Williams, T. Caldwell, M. Powell and J. Rea. Mr. R. Ware presided. Officers were elected as follows: — Mr. J. J. Wood, president; Mr. T. Caldwell, secretary; Mrq. J. Pfahlert, vice-president; Miss K. Spencer and Mr. T. Williams with the above officers, executive committee. All present were elected to' the election committee with power to add. There was an exceptionally good attendnace. Mr. Green and Mr. Ware (delegates to the L.R.C.) spoke at length on the matter of dividing the town into canvassing areas, and the committee decided that they be responsible for the allocation of the blocks. It was unfortunate that many people did not realise that it was an offence not to be on the roll, and whether a person voted or not, steps should be taken to safeguard the public in this respect. The town was divided into twelve blocks, each in the charge of a member of the committee, the area . of Omoto being left in the meantime until suitable arrangements could be made. The blocks are as follows.

(a) Mr. T. Williams— Murray St. to Heaphy St. (b) Mrs. Owens—Railway Station to Lagoon. (c) Miss K. Spencer—Karoro to ' South Beach and Hospital. (d) Mr. M. Powell— Buccleugh St. to Marlborough and Palmerston Sts. (e) Mr. J. Wood— Buccleugh St. to Churchill Terrace. (f) Mr. J. Rea—Railway Station t,o Murray St. (g) Mrs. Erskine—Opera House.to Sawyer’s Creek. (h) Mrs. T. Burley—Marlborough St. to Chesterfield St. . (i) Mrs. Pfahlert—Brunner St. to Morris St. (j) Mr. A. Billett—Blaketown. (k) Mr. R. Ware—Cobden. (l) Mr. C. Crutch— Buccleugh St. to Shakespeare St.

By means of this project, said Mr. J. J. Wood in an interview yesterday, much valuable time would be saved when the .roll eventually came' to hand. Instead of the usual muddle that had been experienced in the past with regard to the filling of a supplementary roll, the Party would this time be prepared for the roll and only a system of checking against the roll would be necessary to determine who had not registered. A report on the operation of the canvassing would' be forwarded to the committee at the next meeting in a fortnight’s time. There were many people who had only just attained the age of 21, and there was also a great number who had been transferred to the electorate from outside provinces. The committee however, would be responsible only for the town, and the L.R.C. would make all arrangements with regard to the hiting of halls throughout the electorate.