LABOUR’S POLICY

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 120, 19 April 1940, Page 2

LABOUR’S POLICY

MR SAVAGE’S REPORT. AUTHENTICITY APPARENT. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, April 18. It was disclosed by the Prime Minister (Hon. P. Eraser) during bis report to this week’s meeting of the Wellington Labour Representation Committee, of which he was one of the delegates to the. Easter Conference, of the Labour Party, that the original manuscript of Mr Savage’s confidential report to the Labour Party Conference had been written during his illness on two sides of a piece of cardboard. Photographs of the manuscript had been taken because it had come to his notice that certain persons were wilfully ami maliciously casting doubt on the authenticity of the report, said Mr Eraser, who exhibited two photographs at the meeting, at which there was an attendance of more than a hundred delegates. Mr Eraser reported on the work ol the conference which was so tragically cut short by the death of Mr Savage, says the official report of the meeting of the Wellington Labour Representation Committee. Mr Eraser dealt especially with the endorsement of the Government’s war policy and the adoption of the manifesto on war drafted and recommended bv the joint executives of the New Zealand Labour Party and Ihe' Eederation of Labour, also the disciplinary measures adopted by the party over association with th° Peace and Anti-Conscription Council of members of the party. He pointed out that the decisions of the conference in regard to these matters were now. binding upon all party affiliations and members. MR LEE’S EXPULSION. Mr Eraser also referred to the expulsion of Mr J. .A. Lee. He staled that he had voted for the 'expuls.on, which be considered fully justified, particularly in view of the unfair and unwarranted attack which Mr Lee had made on Mr Savage. The report was adopted and the action of the delegates endorsed unanimously. The decision of the Easter Conference regarding the Peace and AntiConscription Council was read, and the president (Air J. 0. Johnson) said lie trusted all members present- fully appreciated the position and that no delegate in attendance was a member of that council. The following resolution was adopted : “That the national executive be requested to give an interpretation ol the recent decision of the annual conference regarding the Peace and Anti Conscription Council and what effect the decision has on Labour Party memb-rs who were members ol the council and who have now resigned from it.” EXPULSION OPPOSED. BY WATERSIDE WORKERS. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, April 18. The expulsion of Mr J. A. from the Labour Party was couriered at a stomvork meeting of the AA ellingtoii branch of the AA atersidc Workers Federation yesterday. It was stated subsequently that a motion was put to the meet-ng ,to the effect that th-° bra-cli withdraw its delegates to the Wellington Labour Representation Committee n.s a protest against the expulsion of Mr Lee. Tins motion was said to have been defeated by a small majority, and an amendment that the meeting make an emphatic. protest against the expu sion ot Mr Lee from the Labour Party with a direction that it be handed to the Press, was carried bv a largo majority, it was further stated.