ANTI-SOCIAL ELEMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21159, 16 April 1932, Page 8

ANTI-SOCIAL ELEMENTS.

When word of the Auckland riot of Thursday night reached Parliament, and was mentioneel in the House of Representatives, there were suggestions that starvation and the policy of the Government were its causes. The occupants of the Labour benches, from whom these suggestions came, obviously knew little of what had actually happened. A proper sense of responsibility would have made them wait until they did know before rushing in with such supposititious explanations. For it, is absolutely plain to anybody with the least, knowledge of the actual facts that Thursday night's outbreak was not a. hunger demonstration. The deliberate efforts to revive disorder in Karangahape Road last evening clinch and confirm the conclusion. Thursday's outbreak was no hunger riot. "Whatever it was in the beginning—and those who organised the gathering of unemployed cannot escape responsibility for what followed—it was not an unemployment demonstration. It, was an outburst of the forces of disorder and anarchy seizing a. golden opportunity. The wholesale destruction of property, the unrestrained looting of things a hungry man would pass by without a thought, are the evidence. Those who have always ranked high New Zealand's respect for law and order cannot but be shocked and profoundly distressed by this revelation of the small distance below the surface of a normally good-natured and reasonable community very different forces lurk. Those who are in real want can draw attention to their distress by other means. Those who disagree with the policy of the authorities now responsible, for the country have other ways of expressing their views. Looting and wholesale destruction of property are. not methods of protest, a civilised community can tolerate. Not, only must authority handle such anti-social outbreaks firmly, but, the support of all who value good citizenship and the reputation of the country must be behind it.