PARTIES AND GOVERNMENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume 78, Issue 24134, 28 November 1941, Page 4

PARTIES AND GOVERNMENT

rAKTIIiiS AiNu UU v jEjiuMunn i. Sir, —Are Mr. B. H. Kingston, and the many who agree with him. right when they attribute party strife to 'party government? Surely men and women must differ regarding the policy the nation ought, to follow. Surely people who find themselves in agreement regarding policy will organise to secure the embodiment of that policy in legislation. Is not Mr. Kingston himself organising a party ? Surely when the members of a party comprise a 1 majority of the nation, the policy of 1 that party ought to become the policy 1 of the nation. \ Who, then, ought we to have for ' Ministers, to embody the accepted 1 policy in legislation, and to administer ' the acts • that -will- comprise that- legiß-

lation? Ought they not to he men and women in sympathy with that policy, who will labour to make it a success, rather than men and women opoosed to it, who might labour to make it a failure? Thus, while parties appear to be inevitable, party Government appears to be reasonable. Violent differences lead to quarrelling, ill-will and persecution, but these evils do not originate in any form of Government. They would continue if we had no Government. I think it is true, however, that our present method of electing legislators is foolish and that it gives us a wrangling and ineffective Parliament. Why not vote for parties, in place of voting for individuals, and having thus made known the party entitled to rule, allow that party to elect the members required to "give effect to its policy? In place of that absurdity, an opposition, why not allow each important interest in the country, farming and all others, to elect representatives who, though not numerous enough to dictate policy, would ensure that every measure would be subjected to expert and constructive citicism ? Would not such a Parliament give us work in place of talk ? Manurewa. J. Johnstone,