PLEA FOR LABOUR.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXXII, Issue 2804, 23 November 1931, Page 5

PLEA FOR LABOUR.

SAFEGUARDING LIBERAL LEGISLATION. MR. W. E. PARRY’S ADDRESS. ATTENTIVE PAEROA HEARING. A splendid hearing was given Mr W. E. Parry, Labour candidate for Auckland Central, when he gave a political address on Friday evening in the Gaiety Theatre, Paeroa. His Worship the Mayor (Mr W. Marshall) presided, and the theatre was almost filed to capacity. The address lasted for almost three-hours and was listened to closely, bursts of applause punctuating it at frequent intervals. Interjections wore few, and were mostly of a friendly nature. In opening the meeting Mr Marshall said that it y;as being held under the auspices of the New Zealand Labour i Party, v. ith the object of furthering ! the candidature of Mr .1. S. Montgomerie. Mr Parry had represented Auckland Cental for twelve years, with ever increasing majorities, and at the present election was not only opposed by a Coalition candidate, but also by a Communist. It had been said that Mr Parry was one of the firebrands of Parliament, but he (Mr Marshall) had not found him so. and the fact that he was now being opposed by a Communist showed that it was not considered in his electorate that he held Communistic views. On rising to speak, Mr Parry was ; greeted with prolonged applause. Tak- \ ing a cue from the Mayor, he ap- ■ peak'd to all Labour <npp.-r’>-r-- to ■give a fair and attentive homing to j all opponents. He believed that the : more the people heard from the public platform the mode the Labour I Party gained. It did not lose from H,he public platform, but at the hands r of the daily press. He was not a stranger to the Thames electorate, as he had worked with many of the. men of the district. One of the first things that he had noticed on his arrival in Paeroa was the general air cf cleanliness and tidiness of the town. This spoke well for the local body. - A voice: That's one for the Mayor. I In stating that he was speaking on j behalf of Mr Montgomerie. Mr Parry : said that there was no candidate ’ whom he was more pleased to assist. .Mr Montgomerie was sincere, honest, * and highly respected, and on all the social and local bodies to which he had ,bcen elected he had given great satisfaction. He was one of the best known men in the province on farming masters, and was a man of great executive ability, though he was not a man who always create) a favourable impression at first. If he wa. f returned he would render very real and useful servic<» for his electorate.

. Work of Liberals. Continuing, Mr Parry said that he was pleased to be in Paeroa as far very many years it had been repr sented by one of the old Libctal Piuty in Mr Hugh Poland. When he was removed from the House. Parliament was poorer for his depart ir e. 11 • ha ! given very conscientious work, and had closely watched the interests of the mining community. Had he been appointed Minister of Mines the Dominion to-day would have been much better off. (Applause.) If one Department had been butchered, it was the Mines Department. Few departments were ns important, yet an Ministers of Mines, there had been printers, schoolmasters, and such others of no experience of mining. Departments should be administered by men who had special knowledge, but this had not been done,'' and as a result industry and the State had suffered. (Applause.) Knowing that the electorate had been represented for so long by the old liberal organisation, the speaker said that he wanted to show that the electors of to-day were the trustees of all the legislation placed on the Statute Book by Ballance, Scddon. and Grey. It was necessary to see that this; legislation was not eliminated from the Statute Book, and that the work of the great leaders of the past was preserved intact. The Coalition. The forthcoming contest was due ''i ' ■ c of the greatest examples of ’Doni engineering for party advantage the country had over known. It would be remembered that Mr Forbes had made overtures to Mr Coates for fusion to fight Labour. Mr Coates had refused this, raying thajt there may be other parties springing up. '■•’rung pleasure had been brought to bear from outside Parliament, but still Mr Coates evaded the responsibility of taking over the sins of the United Party. The pressure was kept !■’». for such was the strength of the Labour Party, that it came to be pjeatly feared. Mr Coates had moved setting up of the Inter-Party CommitteefgqggggM

Committee and had been supported by the Labour Party, but Mr Forbes had said that he hoped the result of the conference would be the formation of a National Government. Mr Coates had replied that his resolutions had no reference whatever to this. The conference was set up to enquire and report to the House, but it took its evidence in committee and the House and the country has waited in vain for a report. During the process of the enquiry Mr J. M. Savage had pressed Mr Forbes for certain information from the Treasury, but the Prime Minister had side-stepped this. Mr Savage had kept up the pressure and had been supported by other members. Seeing that this information was essential. Mr Forbes had adjourned the meeting and had taken the anti-Labour members to his own room, where the Treasury officials had given the information in the absence of those members of the Labour Party who had been appointed by Parliament. Hitherto the annual had always been referred to the Finance (,'cmmi tee before being brought before the House. Labour had three representatives on this committee and it bad the power to question the heads of al] departments. Realising that if the estimates went before the committee the Labour Party would be able to get all the information it desired Mr Forbes bad, for the first time in the history of the Dominion, ignored the committee and brought the estimate straight before Parliament. At the Economy Committee Mr Forbes had insisted that fusion was necessary, but Mr Contes had been opposed to this, saying that he could not agree until it was known what the Coalition policy would be. The two jartics could not agree on a policy, and still cannot agree, so to-day the Coalition was before the country without a policy. When the Inter-party Committee had dispersed the Labour Party and the Independents had brought forward reports to Parliament as instructed, but the United and the Reform parties had not yet reported. On the following day the announcement of the wedding had been made. Following Britain. New Zealand would not have had an election this year and electors would haMe been disfranchised Tor twelve months had the British (lections not taken place. Certainly the announcement of the election had been made before the result of the British election was known, but the Coalition had anticipated the result and had hoped to float back on the result of the British election. They saw the possibilities of being able o float along, not on what they had done themselves, but on something that had happened in another part of the world. All their actions had been to save their own political skins and the excuse had been that “we are putting country first.” They were sitting behind it all right, letting it drift along into the hands of vested interests, while they manoeuvred for self preservation. The Old Bogies. ■ The present fight promised to be the most momentous in the history of New Zealand. The issues were more momentous than in 1891 when the daily press had said that the seven devils of socialism had swept i:»t j power. Conditions in 1891 were similar to those of to-day. with unemployment, rtiverty. and bankruptcy. The press said of Seddon, just as they are saying to-day, that the promises could not be carried out.] Seddon, Ballance and Gray had carried out their promises and had made New Zealand the envy of the rest of the world for social legislation. (Applause.) Men had been seat from every country in the world to study New Zealand’s social legislation. Thus, after a long period of Tory rule, terminating in unemployment and bankruptcy, these great LiberalLabour coders, who were classed as the seven devils of Socialism, had given birth tn the Arbitration Court, the Factories Act, Workers’ Compensation, old age pensions, the St. Helen’s Homes, etc. (Applause.) Today the issue was greater, for not only was there the job of reconstructing New Zealand, but there was the greater work of conserving, sacred and inviolate, the social laws secured in the last twenty-five years. Land Policy Scrapped. Prime Minister McKenzie had substituted the old Liberal-Labour land policy of leasehold with the freehold policy, and now there was no freehold for the banks held all the land. The last vestage of old Liberal land laws had been taken away last session in the removal of the graduated land tax. This splendid piece of legislation. which had prevented the aggregation of land, had now been abolished. The old Liberal principles were going with every session of Parliament. Had Sir Joseph Ward lived he would have scorned touching the

policy of his old colleagues. Labour had recognised this and had given him the Treasury Benches and had supported him while he lived. Labour believed that had Sir Joseph lived, the country would not be in the position it was to-day. Labour to-day took up a similar attitude to that taken by Seddon in 1891. (Applause.) Coalition Propaganda. Quoting from a Coalition advertisement, “Keep in step with Britain,” Mr Parry showed that had New Zealand waited for Britain and then followed in step it would hot have had, when it did, the old age pensions. " v orkers’ Compensation, Arbitration Court, State owned railways, the Public Trustee, State insurance, pub'ic hospital system, and assistance towards keeping the men on the land, f te. (Applause.) New Zealand had not waited for Britain and kept in step but had gone ahead on its own, and had shown that it could do things for itself without waiting for any xaniple. In the past it had taken the lead and other countries, Britain included. had fallen in step behind. Today the policy of the Government was *o wait for something to turn up and ‘o do nothing that might offend anybody. It was now seeking to make ♦he most of the British election and to stampede the people with catch-cries. The Coalition Manifesto'. Messrs Forbes and Coates had issued an election manifesto, yet it had not contained one constructive idea as to what should be done to deal with the position now prevailing. All they asked was a free hand. The people of the Dominion could well ask what these two parties had done to entitle them to bo given a free hand. If unemployment, poverty, and bankruptcy qualified them for freedom the people of the country would certainly give them freedom from all further worry. Government’s Actions. Mr Parry proceeded to criticise the actions of the Governments of the past eleven years. He showed that had Labour’s income tax policy been in operation for this period of prosperity there would have been a reserve fund now. He criticised the immigration policy, and quoted an advertisement from a Glasgow newspaper of March last, offering assisted passages, and constant employment at good wages, for domestic, servants, while al the same time, in Now Zealand. Reform members were pleading with the Government to assist unemployed immigrants to get back to the country they had come from? He showed how in 1920 the Coates Government had removed the income tax from the sheep farmers, who were enjoying gretrt prosperity, and the reason Mr Coates had given was that the country did not require the money. Yet in the same year customs duties on goods, required by the masses, had been raised. Wages. The Government was painting the slump worse than it really was, and thus it was aggravating the position. It was not facing the problem in the right way. For example it had reduced wages by 10 per cent., and had thus reduced the money in circulation, so that business men suffered from a reduced turnover, less factory production was required and the unemployment position was aggravated. Fostering Industry.

Primary and secondary industries had to be fostered in order to provide employment for our boys and girls. Mr Parry quoted the possibilities of the manufacture of wool packs from flax, the cleansing of wool, and the potentialities of the honey industry, awl went on to show how Labdur prposed to put these on a firm foundation.

Encouraged by friendly interjections, Mr Parry went on to discuss such matters as soldier settlement, education, Reform's record, Mr Forbe s adverse views in 1913 concerning fusion, the Auckland railway station, the Otahuhu workshops, Whangamarine swamp drainage, etc., earning prolonged applause. Concluding, Mr Parry said that Larhour was submitting its policy freely and fully, and was fighting a party which had no policy, but a recor 1 which did not entitle it to be given a free hand. In the name of progress, unity, and what was good, for all, he urged all sections to join together for advancement and to safeguard what had been gained in the past. No questions were asked and, on the motion of Mr Gallagher, Mr'Parry was accorded a vote of thanks by prolonged applause. Mr .Gallagher pointed out thrt confidence in the Labour Party could be shown at the ballot box in the very near future.