POWER OF THE PRESS

Maoriland Worker, Volume 12, Issue 303, 20 December 1922, Page 1

POWER OF THE PRESS

In 40 constituencies the daily press was, with one or two exceptions, in the hands of the Tory Party. It was violently antiLabour.- Its editors worked energetically for their masters. YetLabour, in these 40 constituencies, polled 26,000 more votes than the Tories. . A great stunt .with the Tory papers was the Bolshevik stunt Lurid pictures were drawn of bloody revolution and streets running red witSi blood. It was pure searemongery, an appeal to feal? and to the basest of passions. v ; ;. Here are some headlines in "The New Zealand Herald** (Auckland Tory) the day before the elections.. .They were in huge black type running full length across the-page::— IP YOU. RETURN THE MASSEY PARTY YOU AVOID Tins RUSSIAN TERKOE CON SPIRACY. Majority Australian Labour Party Exposes Bolshevik Programme. Propaganda Paid from Looted Chtwehcs.. Abolition of Parliament Decreed. Proposed Wholesale Disfranchisement of Voters, . Then follows & full page disquistion -on - Communism and "Bloody Revolution/ , "" -. .What the Au,cklaß;d people thought pf this is indicated thus* Labour votes, 33,815, - LflbtaiM' candidates elected, 5. Tory candidates elected, 4. ■ .The press is,the sieruaiit of falsehood, and wkere the people ', are enlightened thej; treat it with contempt.