PARTY CONTESTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume 78, Issue 24141, 6 December 1941, Page 12

PARTY CONTESTS

EEPLY TO ME. FRASEK "AFRAID OF LOSING SEAT'* MR. HOLLAND'S CONTENTIONS [by telegraph—press association] CHRISTCHURCH, Friday A reply was made to-day by the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. S. G. Holland, to the statement of the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. P. Fraser, in advocating arrangements whereby byelection contests between the Government and Opposition candidates could be avoided between now and the next general election. Mr. Fraser's proposals and reasons were set out in a.letter to Mr. Holland. He said he sincerely trusted that the party contest in the Bay of Plenty and. in the Temuka electorate could bo avoided. _ . "On Wednesday I wrote to the Prime , Minister offering to withdraw from the Bay of Plenty by-election all outside speakers from our side, provided Mr, Fraser did the same," said Mr. Holland. "The reply, a 118-word urgent telegram, I have received from him, quotes that proposal, and intimates Mr. Fraser's decision to make public certain correspondence which he himself made strictly confidential. Such a desion is a flagrant breach of all rules of etiquette and common fair,play. Need for National Government "Obviously the Government is afraid of losing the Bay of Plenty seat, and is prepared to use any method to • avoid such a loss. If the position is as serious as Mr. Fraser says, then I repeat a National Government should be formed immediately, so that our entire resources can be applied to the war effort instead of the half-hearted effort that is now being made in certain directions. ' "There are two sides to every question, and it is just as well the public should be fully informed," Mr. Holland said later. "Postponement of a general election and of a by-election cannot be compared. ' A general election can be postponed by. tlje Government with or without the concurrence of the Opposition, but a by-election cannot be postponed, and any qualified person has a perfectly legal right to be nominated. Breach of Agreement Claimed / "The National Party has •. done its best to avoid contests in the past by not nominating candidates for the Auckland West and Waitemata byelections, but in each instance Independent candidates came forward and made an election necessary. When the National Party lost one of its members, Mr. A. E. Jull, who represented Waipawa, the Labour Party Had a Rood opportunity of avoiding a by-election, but instead it nominated an official candidate and forced a -contest, i. . , ' 'ln the case of the' Bay of Plenty vacancy, a by-election/was inevitable, for at least two Independent candidates would have been nominated, had the National Party not put up a candidate. At the Prime Minister's earnest and urgent request, I agreed to withhold announcing the name of our candidate until Mr. Fraser and I could discuss the matter in the hope of avoiding a contest. I had in mind that a suitable non-party candidate acceptable to both sides might have been found. But before I could possibly see Mr. Fraser, the Labour Party broke the arrangement by announcing its official candidate." SUGGESTION REPUDIATED NO BREACH OF CONFIDENCE PRIME MINISTER EXPLAINS [by telecrafh—press ASSOCIATION] WELLIOTJTOS; Friday "I fail to understand Mr. Holland's outburst or what he is angry about," said the Prime Minister this afternoon in replying to Mr. Holland's statement. "This is not the time to lose tempers. It is not the time to endeavour to score political points. It is the time to try and avoid political party contests in the interests of the country and its war effort." "My letter yesterday to Mr. Holland, sent by wire as a courtesy to him as Leader of the Opposition," Mr. Fraser continued, ''was: not a reply to his letter of December.3, although I took the opportunity when writing to mention its receipt. .My fetter of yesterday was written for the purpose of again suggesting an agreement on the matter of by-elections. That Mr. Holland should resent this is mystifying.' 1 Mr. Fraser repudiated any suggestion of a breach of confidence on his part. "In regard to the announcement of candidates in the Bay of Plenty electorate," said Mr. Fraser, ."it is true that 1 asked Mr. Holland to arrange if possible that the name of the National Party candidate should not, be announced until we had had an opportunity of discussing the possibility of avoiding a contest before the National Party was committed to one. The difference in significance of the respective announcements of the National and Labour candidates is that the former would immediately mean a contest, while the latter had no such result. "The avoidance of a situation which would make a fight in the Bay of Plenty inevitable was the only object of my representations, but even if a mistake had been made in prematurely publishing the Labour candidate's name, that is surely no adequate reason for the Nationalist Party forcing a by-election contest or for rejecting the suggested agreement. "I do not propose to refer to Mr. Holland's references to the Government and myself being in a panic at the prospect of losing the Bay of Plenty seat," added Mr. Fraser, "beyond saying that I am an excellent prophet of election results when I see them on the screen on election night.'' RETORT BY CANDIDATE MINISTER'S WASTE OF TIME x (0.C.) TE KABAKA, Friday "We are ill the field for this byelection and we are going to see it through," said the National Party candidate for the Bay of .Plenty seat, Mir. W, Sullivan, when referring at a meeting at To Kara.ka to-day to the statement by the Prime Minister, Mr. Fraser, concerning the action of the National Party in contesting the seat. He said that so far thore had not been one National Party speaker in the electorate except himself, whereas the other side had already had several speakers, including Cabinet Ministers. Mr. Sullivan also recalled that Mr, Fraser himself was elected to Parliament in a wartime by-election in 1918, yet lie was opposed to by-electioni at this time. Hq also referred to the fact that during the last war the Labour Party had contested a series of byelections, and reminded the meeting that throughout this war the National Party had consistently put forward its offei to join in a National Government. Referring to the time being spent by members of Cabinet in assisting the Labour Party candidate in the election, Mr. Sullivan said that the Minister of Marketing, the Hon. J. G. Barclay, who was paid about £22 a week, had devoted about a week to electioneering. He was not, however, getting very good results as was shown by the fact that at a meeting he addressed at Kutarere there were only six people present.