SIR WILLIAM FRASER.

Marlborough Express, Volume LIII, Issue 195, 20 August 1919, Page 5

SIR WILLIAM FRASER.

REPORTED RETIREMENT

DEfNIEB

fPEftea Association.]

_, WELLINGTON", Aug. 20. A statement was mado in Auckland reoa ltly to the effect that Sir William Frass'r was about to retire from tho Ministry. It was based: on something he was reported tq! have said to the Automobile Association when 'approached by this, body .witlt a request for the expenditure of large .sums of money on permanent 'roads in concrete or some such material.

Sir William Fiasea- said yesterday in regard to this report that h© had. new hinted to tho Automobile Association or to any other body that he intended to retire from the Ministry on- from politics. If he should come to any such decision the first people that he would take into his confidence would be his own constituents. All he had said to the Automobile Association had been that> the request they made involved heavy expenditure, and was one t|hat oiight to. be dealt with /by the ' new Parliament. On the eve of an election he would not commit the country to any such oxpenditiiiire, a<ndi he "did not consider # that he would te justified in pledging the finances of the country heavily under such circumstances.