FREEDOM OF PRESS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 24 April 1937, Page 10

FREEDOM OF PRESS

REPLY TO MR BODKIN GOVERNMENTS FOLICY CONTROL OF RADIO Remarks made by Mr W. A. Bodkin, M.P., during the course of a speech at Waipukurau were the subject oi strong comment by the Acting Prime Minister (the Hon. P. Fraser). Mr Fraser ridiculed the suggestion that there was any intention of the Government to muzzle the Press.

“If Mr Bodkin’s speech at Waipukurau on Tuesday evening is correctly reported, the member for Central Otago must have been suffering from a bad attack of hysteria, perhaps induced by a feeling of desperation over the political fate and prospects of the group with which he is associated,” said Mr Fraser. "The onl part of his hysterics which call for special attention is the following statement:— " ‘lt looked also as if the stage was to be set up for the control of the Press. The Government was to-day absolute master of the radio service, and, recognising that every dictator in the wond has had to muzzle the Press —it had been done in Russia, Germany, and Italy—it looked as if something similar were to be attempted in New Zealand. The outburst of the Rev. C. G. Scrimgeour at Auckland was not the outpouring of a disgruntled public servant. His statement was made by him as the oflicial head of a State Department from a State radio station. This gentleman has earned a reputation for himself as one who could influence public opinion. He was no doubt instructed to prepare public opinion for the setting up of a censorship.’ “BASELESS CONCLUSIONS” “There is absolutely not one iota of fact to justify the baseless conclusions, advanced with all the assurance of tiuth and calculated intentionally or unintentionally to mislead his hearers, contained in that statement. The Government has nevd&- at any time considered for one moment anything so stupid as, to use his own words, muzzling the Press, by which, I suppose, he means a peace-time censorship. The very idea is ridiculous. Reference is made to the control of radio by Mr Bodkin. My reply is, the Government has used the broadcasting service for Parliamentary debates with scrupulous,fairness, and will continue to do so.

“The statement made by Mr Scrimgeour in regard to a section of the Press was made without the consent, knowledge, or approval of the Government. The propriety of a State radio broadcasting station being used by a public servant for controversial purposes has received the attention of the Government. FREEDOM OF SPEECH ‘The Labour Party has always fought for freedom of speech and freedom of expression, and these precious privileges of democracy are safer in the Government’s hands than in those of our political opponents. “It would be a sheer waste of a gooa food ingredient to take the rest of Mr Bodkin’s wild assertions with even one grain of salt. He, and the other reckless and even desperate spokesmen ot the Nationalist agglomeration, will find it fairly difficult to scare farmers, wage-earners, and others whose economic positions have been so much improved by the Government into a thoughtless, suicidal onslaught on their own improved conditions and incomes. Only Nationalist members of Parliament ran amuck in that fashion. Then Mr Bodkin should remember that the poor old anti-Socialisi tom-tom was beaten so hard by some of his present friends, once his opponents whom he denounced as recklessly as he is now attacking Labour, that it burst long ago and now gives out but a feeble, futile noise

“It may be an inducement to Mr Bodkin to continue his present line of invective to learn from the cables that the Budget of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer is being described as a Socialist Budget. He should extend his attack to the Rt. Hon. Neville Chamberlain.”