THE SHORT SESSION

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVII, Issue 10852, 18 March 1921, Page 7

THE SHORT SESSION

LABOUR AMENDMENT BEFORE THE HOUSE* DEBATE ON MR HOLLAND’S PROPOSAL DEFEATED ON DIVISION BY 58 VOTES TO 8

The House of Representatives met at 10 30 a.m. yesterctaj'.

XEW BILL. Mr It. VV. Smith (Waimarino) gave notiee of his intention to ask leave to introduce the Tuumuiunui County Rill. By 11.30 preliminary business, dealt with elsewhere, was completed, and Mr U. J?. Holland (Duller), Chairman of the Labour Rarty, then moved his lengthy amendment to the Addrese-in-Keply. LABOUR AMENDMENT. TIT E REPRESENTATION QUESTION. Mr Holland said this Parliament was called to consider an invitation to the Prime Minister to go to the Imperial Conference and members were entitled to expect that the matter for which Parliament was called together would be seriously discussed. What had happened? With the single exception of Mr Malcolm, not one speaker had touched the fringe of this important question: The Prime Minister he declared, seemed to think it more important that the Prime Minister should be at the Imperial Conference than that New Zealand should be represented. Mr Massey: The Prime Minister represents New Zealand. Mr Holland: I deny that. The figures of the last eleotion show that he represents only a minority of the people. Mr J. McCombs (Lyttelton): Hear, hear. Mr Massey: Oh, no. ("Oh, oh!’ hear, hear and laughter.) . Mr Holland: If the Prime Minister has not seen the aggregate figures I will be pleased to furnish them. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) Why the Labour party proposed that Sir James Allen should represent New Zealand at the conference was because up to the present time pcwitively no information whatever had been given as to what was to be discussed there. Whoever went to the conference should only go with a watching brief, and not to commit this country. Nothing should be done to commit New Zealand until our representative had reported what the conference had done, and the proposals had been sanctioned by the New Zealand Parliament. The sole objection of the Labour party to Sir Francis Bell being left as acting-Prime Minister was that he was not responsible to a popular constituency, that the House of Representatives could not reach him. and that no constituency could reach him. '‘COULD NOT TRUST THEM.” Mr Holland strongly protested against the Prime Minister showing confidentially to certain Press men Mr Lloyd George’s cablegram inviting him to the Imperial Conference, when no refused to send copies to every member of Parliament. If oertain Press men had a right to see the cablegram confidentially, surely hon. member® had that right. Mr Massey: They had.no right. Mr Holland: Then, why did the Prime Minister show to the Press men what he would not show to members of Parliament? _ Mr J. Vigor Brown (Napier) -. He could not trust some of them perhaps. (Laughter.) Mr Holland: Perhaps he would not trust the member for Napier, and therefore would not show it. (Laughter.) One of the subjects that would be discussed at the conference, lie added, would, no doubt, be the renewal ef the AngloJapaneee Treaty. He contended, however, that since England and Japan were now both members of the League of Nations, there was no need for the renewal of this war treaty. Mr Holland reviewed at great length tjie secret diplomacy, which, he declared, brought about the war; and detailed certain secret diplomacy whioh he alleged was going om throughout the. war for carving up territory and handing over populations of several millions to Italy, to Greeoe, and to Boumania, in order to induce them to come into the war on the side of the Allies. "EUROPE BANKRUPT." The war had ended, he declared, with Europe bankrupt, -and the nations of Central Europe starving. Germany owed a very large debt to the Allies, the Allies owe<i a great deed of money to Britain, and Britain owed a great deal to America. The British soldiere had fought to protect the property rights of the capitalists of Britain, but the only terms in which the capitalists would allow them to be fed and clothed a/nd munitioned while they so fought was that the people of Britain should pay them 400 millions in interest on the war loons. ("Oh, oh!" and hear, hear.> The soldiers who had survived the war had now to work to help pay that huge sum each year. In conclusion, he strongly urged that the New Zealand delegate to the conference should be instructed to resist every movement in the direction of increased armaments; to oppose every suggestion making for the precipitation of war with America or any other country; and; on every occasion to urge the lin£iug-up of the peoples of all countries in a commonwealth of industry and peace. (Applause.)

SELF-GOVERNED OR IMPERIALLY GOVERNED?

Mr D. G. SuTtivan (Avon), in seconding the amendment, asked the Prime Minister to define, in the course of the debate, the extent to which New Zealand is a aelf-goveming Dominion on the one hand, and the extent to which, on the other hand, this country is controlled by the Imperial authorities. The question we had to solve at the present time, he said, was to what extent we wore prepared to forego our liberties and, consent to government from Britain in regard to Imperial matters. In the course of the debate Mr Malcolm (Clutha) had declared that some sort of constitution and executive was necessary in. order to secure combined action in Imperial affairs; and that a State could not carry on a great war without sovereignty. The Prime Minister, too. had said that he hoped we should. have a constitution for the Empire before we were very much older. He could not help wondering and fearing, therefore, what the Prime Minister might be asked to commit the country to in the way of an Imperial constitution and Imperial sowi 1„." over this Dominion. If it could be shown that Britain was a true democracy, and that the Prime Minister and Government of Britain truly represented the people of Britain, he would not be afraid of Mr Massey representing New Zealand at the Imperial Conference. Hut Britain, he contended, was very far from being a true democracy, and therefore he was afraid of what might happen. The financiers of Groat Britain were, he said, the real rulers of the country and he feared that their huge interests abroad might involve us in further wars. We ought, he urged, to be very careful not to put the country into such a position that its foreign policy would be dictated by the big financiers of Great Britain. We must not tie the Dominion to the chariot wheels of British Imperialism. ■ whether that chariot was driven by Imperialists seeking world-Hmpire or by financiers seeking their own sordid gain. What the Labour party looked forward to was a .federation of free peoples to secure the peace of the world. (Applause.) NO FORCED LOAN. Dr. A. K. Newman (Wellington East) said that ho felt that New Zealand was in a very sick position at the present

time; ami' he was afraid that if the Prime Minister went away for . six months and Parliament did not sit tor that length of time the right remedy might not be available at the time it was needed. People were seriously apprehensive that there would be further leveed loans in this country. Mi- Massey: There will be no forced loan, you can say so. Peox.)le were in dire distress for lack of money, added Dr Newman. Though financial stress followed upon every war, the people did not seem to realise it. One well-known man, who was in dire straits, had told him that he did not know that such a .stringency would come. He did not read books, he confessed-. and so he did not know. He (Dr Newman) had predicted long ego that the fat years of the war would be swallowed up by the lean years after the war; and he had been told, that Le was ‘’'cold-footed/'* a crier of ‘’'stinkingfish,” and so on. Hr suggested that cur taxation' should be spaced out more over the whole year, and the same with loons raised in the country. At present the direct taxation came in too much of a lump, and that before- the great part of our harvest cam© in. England collected her income-tax in two instalments, and New Zealand should do the same. The income-tax had com© in very well, it was true: but ho believed it was because the Prime Minister had allowed the biff company® to pav partly by bills. Otherwise it would not have come in. He believed that money "was scare© in New Zealand to-day, because overseas investors were so afraid of further forced loans, and also because the Government was tvyin<r to keep the rate of interest lower hero than it was anywhere else in the world. He suggested i that the Finance Minister could relievo taxation upon the necessaries of life by putting on luxury taxes. Relief should also be given in respect of the income-tax. Ho urged the necessity for prompt legislation in regard to house-rents, the housing problem generally, and other attars, and suggested that a list of such measures should be drawn up, and that Parliament should sit until they were put through, even if Mr Massey had to leave the country some weeks before ihat could be done. If Parliament also met early in August, it would i do a great deal' of good. Mr M. .J. Savage (Auckland West) said that the Prime Minister and others had been urging our people to produce more, but it seemed to him that we ought first to clear the stocks of wool, meat, etc., already accumulated. A good deal of this accumulation could be marketed in New Zealand, if the prices were only reasonable. We ought to encourage trade to Europe, including even Russia.

Mr 3>. Jones (Kaiapoi): We can't take their naper money. He added that our meat could be sold at top prices if only it could be got on board ship. The Prime Minister had said, added Mr Savage, that the Government was providing for the coming of unemployment. How was the Government providing? Was it getting the soup-kitchens ready? (Laughter.) The root of the difficulty, he said, was that the whole of the machinery of banking was in the hands of individuals. There was plenty of work to be done, and why should not our public credit, local and national, be monopolised by the State, without the aid of private bankers, to do that work and keep the people employed? But nothing of the sort was done, and yet we were still importing immigrants from Britain, who when they got here would only be able to walk the streets alongside our own unemployed. The Chamber was representative of the moneyed interests and nothing would be done; but the time for accounting would come. H© denied that Mr Massey truly represented the Dominion; and he contended that no man could truly represent the country at the Imperial Conference until he first knew the views of the people as to the matters that were to be discussed there# "QUITE SAFE IN THEIR HANDS.” Mr A. McNicol (Pahiatua) said that we could safely allow British statesmen to determine our foreign policy for us. They would never throw tta into war. Their object was always to keep the Empire out of war. The Labour members had spoken of disarmament, but he held that the British Navy was the greatest bulwark of the peace of the world; and, therefore, we ought to help to maintain its supremacy. The British Empire contained one-fifth of the population of the world, and when the Empire was at -peace one-fifth at least of the world wa® at peace. But the Labour members, with their' view on Ireland, India, and Egypt, would wreck the peace of the Empire, "SOMETHING UR HIS SLEEVE. 1 * Mr W. E. Parry (Auckland Central) said that he was of opinion that the Prime Minister knew something more about the conference than he had told the House. He thought that the Prime Minister had got something up his sleeve. He should let the House know all that there was to know in regard to the matter. Dealing with the question of unemployment, he asked whether the Prime Minister would undertake to find work for the unemployed if the number ©welled; or, failing employment, would he provide them with reasonable subsistence? In Canada there were hundreds of thousands of unemployed, and the position was so serious that the Canadian Government had imposed a poll-tax on all immigrants. In Australia there were 50,00 unemployed ; and it looked as if New Zealand was going to have a very hard winter —much harder than last winter. The housing problem would be much more acute, and that was due to the large number of immigrants that had come here. He believed that the legislation passed by the Government last year was not worth the paperTt was printed on, so far as building homes was concerned. The Government was so slow in getting anything like a move on. Mr L. M. Isitt (Christchurch North) strongly denounced the Bolshevist tendencies of the extreme Labour men. camouflaged under the fine sentiments distributed throughout their speeches and throughout the Labour amendment. He charged that, both in their speeches and their written utterances, the members of the party went as near to loyalty as they dared. LAND AND LAWYERS' FEES. Mr .David Jones (KAiapoi) said that the speech of the Leader of the Labour Party, travelling as it did over India and Egypt and the history of secret diplomacy, said a good deal for his industry and for his -scissors. He regretted that the Leader of the Opposition &i».d his followers had not taken the opportunity of discussing in a serious, illuminatincT manner the important Imperial questions that the Imperial Conference would have to deal with. The House had cot no light nor leading from them on such vital matters, for example, as that of naval defence. The Leader of the Opposition had spoken of oui* rational debt as ,£201 ,000,000: but he said nothing about the assets. He did rot mention that a great part of it was in-terest-earning. Colonel Mitchell (Wellington South): Is the war debt interest-earning? Mr Jones: No, but a great part of the

debt is. There are also the twenty millions of accumulated surpluses, which arc not only interest-bearing, but have settled a great many studious on the land. 'j.he hon. member had repeatedly urged that land should have been taken compulsorily for soldier-settlement; but they knew what taking land by compulsion had meant in the past. It had been a happy hunting ground for lawyers. And, jf tiie Government ’ had token land by compulsion the soldiers would have to bear not only the cost of the land, but the lawyer's fees too. They would have been capitalised and loaded on them. He contended that land on the whole that had been bought for sol-dier-settlement had been bought well. In Canterbury, as the Prime. Minister had stated, only 1 per cent, of the soldier - soldiers were in arrears On© man who had bought land very dearly at a price which, it. was said, would criush him to the earth —liatj threshed out 101 bushels to the aero. Colonel Mitchell: How much land? Mr Howard: Half an acre!

Mr Jones; Thirty acres. He regretted the way in which* the soldier was being made the football of party politics, and their credit was discounted. The soldier did not thank -Colonel Mitchell and other members for that sort of thing. ("Hear, hear! Hear, hear!” from the Reform party.) We had. he contended, to bear our fair share of Imperial burdens; and w© must before long increase our contribution to .the British Navy. Ho denied, that our meat market had fallen to pieces. It., was ns a matter of fact, never better. The only difficulty was to get’ our meat there. Six refrigerated ships should have left our ports in January, and seven in February; but, owing to the trouble on the waterfront, not one of the thirteen had gone. If the Labour party would only do a. little missionary" work on the waterfront to facilitate the marketing of our they would do far more good for the country than on their present lines. (Applause.) "SELF-DETERMINATION." Air P. Fraser (Wellington Central), quoting Mr H. G. Wells's “Russia in the Shadows,” said that communism had not overthrown the Russian system, but the chaos in Russia was due to the collapse of a rotten system set up by capitalism; it was not communism, but European Imperialism, that plunged that unfortunate country into six years of war; and it was that Imperialism which, by subsidised raids and an economic blockade wa© keeping Russia in a . state of unrest. Tlie Labour party, he declared, stood for proper constitutional methods of obtaining the power of government in this country—the use of tho vote, and that by the most democratic system possible, which no other partystood for, proportional representation. The war had been “a war to end war/’ but now men in this House were talking of a bigger war than ever. ll© had not time to deal fully with the question of the German indemnitybut he claimed that some of the greatest bankers and economists maintained tha.t the sooner tho idea of making Germany pay an indemnity of 10,000 milliine was dropped the better. The very utmost that Germany could afford to pay was, it was estimated, 2120 million®. We could only get the indemnity paid in goods, and. that would throw our own people out of employment. He strongly supported the demand for self-determination on tho part of email nations including those wi/thin the Empire. Denouncing British misgoverament in Ireland, he ©aid that he did not stand for bloodshed. Me Maesey: Would you punish those guilty of murder? Mr Fraser: I would put Mr Lloyd George and his Government on trial for murder. (“Oh, oh!”) Yes; any Government that subsidises that paper that incites the “Black and Tans” to outrage and murder should be put on trial for murder. (“Oh, oh!”) He was not a Sinn Feiner; but he held that a people had a right to say how it would be governed. 1 THE DEBATE DRAGS ON. Mr V. Potter (Roskili) thought little remained to be said after the “able speech delivered by Mr Jones.” He was astounded that the Labour people who had moved “this rigmarole” should take suoh an interest in the Nation. Complaints were made about secrecy, but it was essential to dioiomacy, and it was employed by the Labour organisations. The workers had to be the salvation of the Dominion, and good would come if the agitating Labour leaders were got rid of. He was glad. Mr Massey was to lepresent us at the Imperial Conference. Mr R. W. Smith (Waimarino) said he would vote against Mr Holland's amendment. He thought that while Mr Massey was away things could go on under the leadership of the Hon. D. H. Guthrie, and that if that were arranged a truce could be guaranteed. Something would have to be done to protect the genuine worker from the Labour agitators. He hoped that while Mr Massey was away the Railways portfolio would be placed in the hands of some strong man, and he complained that great difficulty was experienced in securing bracks for the carriage of timber. Mr EL J. Howard (Christchurch South) said w© had to talk Imperialism because we required to raise a largo sum cf money in Ekigland shortly. He did not chink the h«*ad of the Government should leave New Zealand at the present time, because we were likelv to be freed with industrial troubles. He attacked some utterances made by Mr Isitt earlier in the day, and described Mr Isitt as a professional clown. "A CONTEMPTIBLE CAD.” Shortly after Mr F. N. Bartram (Grey Lynn) protested against the debate being continued at that hour, seeing that a commencement had been made more than ten hours previously. He had intended to speak, but now merely protested against Government by exhustion. Other speakers were Messrs A. Harris (Waitemakta), J. McCombs (Lyttelton), H. Atmore (Nelson.). Mr Atmore devoted a good deal of time to oirticism of the Labour members of the House, and in the course of his speech he was referred to by Mr Bartram ae a “contemptible cad/' > The Speaker ordered tlie withdrawal of the remark, , and Mr Bartram did 60. Just on 2 p.m. a division was taken, on Mr Holland's amendment, and the result was the defeat of that amendment by 58 rotes to 8. The original motion was then carried without division. The House then rose. LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL NO BUSINESS. The Legislative Council ©at at 2.30 p.m. and adjourned almost immediately without transacting any business.