The Hawera Star. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1928. SIR JOSEPH WARD’S “GREAT ILLUSION.”

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 17 October 1928, Page 6

The Hawera Star.

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1928. SIR JOSEPH WARD’S “GREAT ILLUSION.”

Delivered every evening by b o’clock In tfawerA. Manair.. Normanby. Okaiawa, Eltham. Manyatoki. Kaponga. Alton, Turleyvllle Patea, Waverlev, Mo„oia, Whakamara, Ohangai, Meremere. Praser Road, and Ararata.

According to the statements made by Sir Joseph Ward at Auckland 'last night, when he revealed the long awaited policy of the United Party, the public is not going to be denied that measure of sensationalism which it regards, lightly or wrongly, as its due when it shoulders the expense and trouble of ‘electing a new Parliament. When the selection of Sir Joseph Ward as leader of the Uniteds- was announced, it was possible to anticipate that the new party would conic before the public with ait, least one good shot in its locker —good, that is, from a publicity point of view. It has long been obvious that the re-united Liberals and Nationalists would need to include in their platform at least a few planks of a startling nature in order to draw serious attention to themselves, and their next need would be to find a leader who could produce those planks, suddenly, wizardlike, with an air of conviction. Many other people anticipated that this would be the Uniteds’ plan of campaign, and thus it got about, long before Sir Joseph had himself been officially approached, that he was to be the man to do the deed. The grounds for this assumption ■on the part- of the public were not difficult to discover, for Sir Joseph Ward I was so patently the only man possibly available to the United Party with; the personality and experience to do the trick. And last night at the Auckland Town Hall Sir Joseph did the trick very effectively] After creating an atmosphere of expectancy by keeping his policy carefully shrouded in. mystery, the veteran leader faced an overflow audience which was all agog to see the performance of the illusion. They were not disappointed, for after toying with some of the old favourites 1 , such as “the party stands in the interests of the whole of' the people,” etc.,' Bir Joseph suddenly produced from, nowhere, in full view of the admiring * throng, the piece do resistance of the programme. This, briefly, was a scheme to -borrow seventy millions within one year, spend sixty millions on advances to workers and settlers and throw the other ten millions in the general direction of the railways service; further, to bring 300,000 to 400,000 new settlers to the Dominion within eight years for the purpose of helping the rest of us, it. may be presumed, to pay the interest on the seventy millions. Though Sir Joseph put his scheme before his hearers almost baldly as we do here, he wti; too i astute to use such a crude expression as | ‘ ‘borrow. ’ ’ His actual words were that he would “undertake to bring into this country within twelve months 1 seventy millions sterling. ’ ’ It has to be admitted that “bring” has a much more reassuring flavour than “borrow,” and •it is ever so much a better word to use immediately after condemning the Government for its high taxation, due to its borrowing policy. Not content .with, the triumph be scored over his eager audience with the presentation of this “turn,” Sir Joseph proceeded to show how the trick was done. Like the best “experiments” of the great illusionists, this one is amazingly simple once it has been explained. The seventy millions which would be brought ■into the country would not increase by one penny the burden, of debt under which the Dominion is said by the Uniteds to be groaning. The people to w’hom the money would be lent would themselves pay .interest and sinking fund and, except for the presence of several hundred thousands more people in the country and the great wave of prosperity that would set in for everybody, the rest of us need never know that the country’s debt Iml been increased by seventy millions in twelve months! A truly admirable piece of stage-craft—but we doubt whether Sir Joseph Ward’s understudies will be capable of performing the same illusion with similar success when they are “playing the smalls.”