N.Z. LEGION

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 104, 13 April 1933, Page 7

N.Z. LEGION

AIMS AND OBJECTS ANSWERS TO CRITICISMS, MEETING AT WAIPUKURAU. A meeting of the New Zealand Legion to place its aims find objects before the public was held at the Masonic Hall, Waipukurau, last evening. The meeting was addressed by Mr J. D, Ormond, junr., and Mr A. D. Morrison, of Hastings. Mr J. Byrne, of Wallingford, presided, and the speakers were accorded an enthusiastic hearing from a good attendance. Mr Ormoud, in his opening remarks, disposed of any impression that the Legion was supported by or had anything to du with a political party. He said that it had no members of Parliament, uor had even “the well-inform-ed Mr Holland’’ been approached on the subject. Mr Ormond then outlined the objects of the Legion, which were published in detail in the issue of the “Tribune” of Friday last. THE LEGION WILL HELP. • Few people realised the serious financial position of the country today, said Mr Ormond. To-day the country’s financial position was just as bad as it was two years ago. The country, as it were, was on the verge of a precipice, the people shattered, nervy and unorganised, and if a crash came chaos would prevail. The Legion would help people and endeavour to keep outside pressure from having an undue influence on members. Its sols aim was for more efficient Government, central and local, based on national and not on sectional interests. Its pledge was loyalty to the constitution. “We mention here our sole aim,’’ said Mr Ormond. “Some people might call it our policy, but we say definitely that we will not help auy man who puts out a flowery platform, who advocates cheap money or who makes political promises that we know he can’t abide by. All we ask of any man is to secure some form of government, both local and central, best suited to the needs of the Dominion.’’ Mr Ormond went on to say that this movement could only be put into practice if people were prepared to give service, and to make sacrifices. It depended entirely on the people themselves what the ultimate result would be.

ANSWER TO CRITICISM. “The Legion has been charged in various quarters by ignorant people with meeting in. a. ‘hole-in-corner’ manner behind closed doors and discussing things in secret,’’ said Mr A. D. Morrison. The speaker pointed out that any movement had to start somehow, and that its promoters had to decide how to set about it and to discuss it among themselves first of all. They had first to get together and make up their minds what they intended to do. The charge of ‘hole-in-corn-er’ methods was perfectly true as regards the initial movements of the Legion, but when a movement of any sort was being set. afoot it was hardly likely that its movers would make public their intentions before the proposal was launched. This should be enough for any man or woman so far as disposing of the objections relating to ‘ holo-and-corner ’ methods. Another criticism, made against the movement was that it had no policy. The whole idea of the Legion was that the political parties as known to-day had toe much policy. Here the speaker referred to the party whip methods, and advocated the breaking of them. Continuing, Mr Morrison said that the Legion could be described as originating from a query in Dr. Campbell Begg’s mind as to what was wrong with New Zealand and why. The Legion aimed to find men who could be sent up to represent the interests of the community without being influenced by party considerations. THE SPIRIT OF TRUST. If they could get the spirit of trust in the right men embedded in all the electorates of New Zealand, then the Legion would have done something worth while. There were men who placed their own interests before those of the public and the Legion was out to put this right by sending men up to public positions of all kinds who had no axes to grind. The Legion was out to break the party system. It was not a party movement, it was not a new party, and it was a travesty of the movement to call it such. The Legion had only one opposition, and that was represented by the disruptive forces that were in existence. Here the speaker referred to the Bolshevistic element in New Zealand and stated that the Legion was against all that kind of thing. He then referred to over-representa-tion and said that the country could do without a proportion of its members of Parliament- Great Britain, he said, had 615 members, representing a population of 45,000,000 people; New Zealand had SO, representing 1,800,000.

Therefore, whereas Great Britain had one member for every 73,000, New Zealand had one for every 18,000. The proportion in representation was four to one in favour of New Zealand. Mr Morrison clinched his argument by saying: “Therefore we could dump three out of every four members of Parliament and have the same Government in proportion as exists in the Old Country—provided we had the same kind of men.” “HOT STUFF.” Mr Morrison then dealt with criticisms levelled at the Legion in a recent speech by Mr H. M. Christie. Refer, ring to Mr Christie’s dubbing of the movement as a “Mustard Club”, Mr Morrison said: “It is a mustard club all right—hot stuff. If Mr Christie bites into it too hard, he may burn his tongue”. In reference to the criticism that the Legion had no policy, he said that he would deliberately state that it hud no policy, because it had to send men who would deal with public questions as they came up and who had no prearranged platform. At the conclusion of Mr Morrison’s address a number of questions were asked and dealt with, after which the meeting closed with a vote of thanks to the speakers and the chair. Over 50 new members were enrolled.