ALLEGED SLANDER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19265, 2 March 1926, Page 9

ALLEGED SLANDER.

LABOUR LEADERS' ACTIONS.

THREE CASES IN ENGLAND.

gun _ LONDON. Fob. 28. Mr. A. J. Cook, general secretary of the Miners' Federation, has issued a writ against the Duke of Northumberland, claiming damages and an apology for a statement in a speech delivered by the duke at Birmingham. In this he is alleged to have asserted that Mr. Cook was the representative of the Ihird (Communist) International on the executive of the Miners' Federation. Mr. Cook strenuously denies this assertion. He says his orders come from the British miner and from nobody else, and, moreover, ho has no connection "with the International.

Mr. J. Wheatley, Labour M.P. for Glasgow, Shettleston, who was Minister of Health in Mr. Ramsay Mac Donald's Cabinet, is claiming £3OOO damages for alleged slander from the publisher of thb Glasgow Eastern Argus. Ho is also claiming £3OOO from Mr. J. M. R. Miller, his Conservative opponent at the last general election, in connection with a letter which was published in the Argus, which charged Mr. Wheatley with dishonesty, crookedness, meanness and a display of excessive interest in convicted coiners.

The actions are a sequel to Mr. Wheatley's challenge offering £IOOO to anyone who would publish certain unfounded rumours which were in circulation in Glasgow.