BIG BLACK WOLF

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23319, 12 April 1939, Page 13

BIG BLACK WOLF

DENIAL OE EXISTENCE NOT WAITING ROUND CORNER PRIME MINISTER'S ASSURANCE FULL CONFIDENCE IN PEOPLE [BY TELEGRAPH —FJIESB ASSOCIATION] WELLINGTON, Tuesday A declaration that there was 110 big black wolf round the corner in New Zealand, and that if he did appear at the corner he. would come from the imagination of tho people and from the fact that the people had lost hope and did not trust themselves, was made by the Prime Minister, Mr. Savage, in a brief address at a dance tendered to delegates to the conference of the New Zealand Labour Party and visitors in the Town Hall this evening. Mr. Savage arrived at the dance shortly before 9 p.m. and was welcomed by the president of the Wellington Labour Representation Committee, Mr. J. G. Johnson. The Prime Minister was accorded musical honours. He entered thoroughly into the spirit of the evening and immediately assured his hearers that he was not going to talk about politics. "I am not going to make a political speech," said Mr. Savage. "I think that hardly necessary. Mr. Hamilton j is doing that at present. It is delightful to bo able to turn aside from politics for at least one evening and speak about the lighter side of our existence. 1 want to assure you we are not nearly so black as wo are painted. We are just people who have had a lot of experience of the rough and tumble side of life. Most of us received our education along the highways and byways in factories and in mines, and that developed our reasoning capacity. "1 once heard a well-known educationist say that education was the power to use one's reasoning under any set of conditions,''' continued Mr. Savage. "Labourites have been trained to use their reasoning, and in the use of it they generally know which side the bread is buttered 011. What a dull life it would be if we bad to be content with reading, say, the leading articles in the newspapers. "It is delightful to be able to think of the big black wolf around the corner, the fellow who is waiting for you. That is the tendency because some people really believe that if a thing is said often enough there must be something in it. I want to assure you there is nothing in it. If that big black wolf appears at the corner be conies from the people's imagination—from the fact that you have lost hope and that you do not trust yourselves. "Well, I have not lost confidence in you at all," added Mr. Savage. "1 know things arc all right. I have not lost confidence in myself and I am sure the people of this country have not cither."