The Hawera Star FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 1935. CATCHING UP WITH A CANARD.

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 23 August 1935, Page 6

The Hawera Star

FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 1935. CATCHING UP WITH A CANARD.

Delivered every evt-iing by 5 o clock m Hawera. Manaia, Kaupokonul, OtaKeuo Oeo, Pibaina, Opunake, Eltham, Ngaeie Mangatoki, Kaponga, Awatuna. Te Kiri. -Mahoe, Lowgarth, Alanutahi, Kakara mea, Alton, Hurleyville. Patea, Whenua kura, Waverley, Mokoia, Whakamara. Ohangai. Meremere. Fraser Hoad and Ararata.

The reactions in New Zealand to the . statement Mr. Forbes is alleged to have, made in Canada about New Zealand’s position in the event of Great Britain declaring war, demonstrates yet once again how easy it is to misrepresent a speaker or a writer by divorcing a statement from its context, and also how difficult it is to overtake a false statement that has been given any kind of a start. At his first public appearance upon his return to his own country the Prime Minister was greeted with cries from a noisy minority in the Wellington Town Hall of “We won’t go to war.” He also found upon his return quite a pile of communications, resolutions from various organisations and other messages, objecting to the statement alleged to have been made by him in Canada. The alleged utterance which has called forth objections was, according to a cabled summary, to the effect that New Zealand would automatically join Britain in the event of the Homeland entering upon a state of war. Since his return Mr. Forbes has made it clear that what he did say was only a repetition of a statement he had previously made in Parliament here, to the effect that “there must be no blinking the fact that if Great Britain became involved in war New Zealand would also be involved;” but Mr. Forbes claims that he made it clear in Canada, as he had made it clear in his Parliamentary speech last February, that New Zealand would only fight after the country had expressed, through Parliament, its willingness to go to Britain’s aid. No level-headed New Zealander should find any difficulty 'in accepting the Prime Minister’s assurance that he said no more nor no less than this. As Mr. Forbes has said, there is no use “blinking the fact” that if Britain became involved in a war of any magnitude and duration New Zealand would be inevitably involved. Sentiment would undoubtedly play a part, for there would always be found in this country a considerable number of people who would regard it as a duty to do what they could to assist Great Britain for her own sake : but selfinterest would also dictate New Zealand’s part in any war in which Great Britain was a principal. Those persons who have imagined that the Prime Minister went through Canada ranting about what New Zealand would do for the Old Country in any future war, do not do justice to their own intelligence, to say nothing of the injustice they do the Prime Minister.