MINISTER'S REPLY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22722, 7 May 1937, Page 11

MINISTER'S REPLY

ME. SAVAGE CRITICISED j

REMARKS ABOUT MANDATES

"IGNORANT OF SUBJECT"

By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright SYDNEY, May 6 f "Clearly Mr. Savage does not know what he is talking about," said Sir George Pearce, Federal Minister of External Affairs, in replying to the New Zealand Jrime j Minister's comment, yesterday on <.l the Empire's administration of former German colonies.- ~ j Sir George added: "As fa? as New. Guinea is concerned Australian-admin-istration has always received a firstclass pass from the Mandates Commission, which is composed of experts well qualified to judge." Mr. W. M. Hughes, in recalling his Prime Ministership in 1919 when the mandate over New -Guinea was taken over, said that wonderful work had been done there. Since then the white population had increased 400 per cent, and the value of exports had increased by 500 per cent. ■ . In 1914 Germany had 200 soldiers there and Australia now had only one. AUDIENCE WITH KING MR. SAVAGE HONOURED (Received May 6, 11.5 p.m.) LONDON, May 6 The King granted an audience to-day to the New Zealand Prfme Minister, Mr. M. J. Savage. "INDISCRETIONS ABROAD" MR. SAVAGE'S UTTERANCES COMMENT BY MR. F. W. DOIDGE The first public statement By the Prime Minister, Mr. Savage, in Great Britain was frankly. criticised by Mr. F. W. Doidge. when speaking to supporters of the National Party in the Eden electorate last night. "If there are more like it we shall expect to see issued a volume entitled 'The Indiscretions of Mr. Savage Abroad'," he said.

Mr. Doidge said that to the people of Britain Mr. Savage had declared: "We are determined to increase trade. We are not going to be harnessed to the chariot wheels of any country." "What does Mr. Savage mean' by that?" asked Mr. Doidge. "Britain is the country into which we pour our primary products. Britain takes 90 per cent of all we export. Without a sheltered market in Britain we should starve. Antagonise the British market and we annihilate the primary producer in New Zealand. " 'We aim to have our own monetary system in New Zealand,' says Mr. Savage. No one has yet succeeded in obtaining from Mr. Savage a lucid explanation of what his monetary policy means. Mr. Nash has. ridiculed the Social Credit supporters, and Mr. Semple declares that only a . fool believes money can be turned like sausages out of a machine. "People at Home will be reminded by this utterance that Mr. Savage is the Prime Minister who pledged himself to 'create' and 'manufacture' money," continued Mr. Doidge. "His latest declaration will add to the mystification of Mincing Lane, where in the course of the next three years we have to seek £17,000,000 in loan redemption." Mr. Doidge said Mr. Savage's suggestion that the Empire had mishandled the mandated territories would cause surprise, in view of the fact that his Government's administration of Samoa had so lately been the subject of criticism at Geneva.

"There is a hectoring note in Mr. Savage's observations about raising the status of the ■worker," said Mr. Doidge. "In Britain it has long been an accepted tenet that- ultimately and fundamentally the objects of all honest political endeavour, in country, must be the raising of the stan- >_ dard of life.-. As Mr. Savage becomes better acquainted with the statesmen of Britain he may develop a little political modesty. , "Mr. Savage found it necessary to declare that there was no dynamite'in his pocket. The trouble is that Mr. Savage does not know dynamite—least of all political dynamite—when he sees it."