NO NATIONAL GOVERNMENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23995, 19 June 1941, Page 8

NO NATIONAL GOVERNMENT

A clear declaration that "there is not going to be National Government" and that, therefore, the Labour Party must prepare for an election, is made by the Standard, official organ of the New Zealand Labour Movement. Coming from such a source, the decision has, unhappily, to be accepted as authoritative and final. Many New Zcalanders, and probably a majority, will deplore this Labour ukase, believing that the emergency calls for and demands a closing of the ranks in an all-in effort directed by a Government representing all parties and commanding tlie confidence of all the people. Their patriotic desire has been brusquely denied. Party rule is to continue; the waste and distraction and division of a general election is to be visited on them. But at least everyone now knows where the responsibility lies. The repeated offers of the Opposition of union in war effort have been finally and totally rejected. The mask is off. Labour insists on clinging to office on the narrow raft of sectionalism. Furthermore, its official mouthpiece virtually declares war. "This election will be the [hardest fought in the history of this

country," it asserts. "Make no mistake about that." The people know in their hearts that there is another fight a thousand times more worth fighting, a light that must be fought, a light that is being fought by their sons. They are sickened at the thought that, while this crucial battle is at its height, they at home are condemned by smallminded Labour extremists to a petty, political shamlight. The trade union bosses have willed it. Instead of joining hands, they prefer to throw down the gauntlet—without due cause, needlessly. However reluctantly, the challenge must be taken up and, there can be little doubt, the Labour politicians will again, as they were last month, be confounded at the verdict of the people on their self-seeking.