THE VOLTE FACE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22269, 23 May 1934, Page 6

THE VOLTE FACE

The fact that the policy of-the-Labour-Party is subject to revision and liable to alteration at every annual conference must be fraught with inconvenience to those members of the party who pride themselves upon their political principles. A member who has been earnestly advocating on the public platform a course of action that forms part of the party’s programme is, it might be supposed, placed in a decidedly awkward predicament if the Easter conference remorselessly resolves upon a change of front which demands that his eloquence shall thereafter be directed towards a different end. Such an untoward happening has been recorded more than ouce, aud no doubt will occur again. The party’s land policy has undergone revision on various occasions. Some years ago the programme harmonised with the objective of socialisation. It provided that there should he no transfer of land except to the State, In course of time, therefore, the State would have become the sole owner of the land of the country. The land would, in consequence, have been socialised. Prompted, however, by the belief that an open con-

fession of this aim would alienate the small capitalists whose support it sought and claimed, the party, while adhering to its objective, modified the terns of the programme which it offers the public for immediate consumption. It has not escaped notice that its present leader’s speeches on the subject strongly suggest a movement towards “the Right.” Nevertheless, a few local members of the party, with perhaps less political guile,-continue to argue in favour of the confiscation of all private property. But no “ volte face ” that has been executed by the party is more complete than that represented by its abandonment of the principle of proportional representation which was included in its programme for several years. The readiness with which it has somersaulted would, it is to be feared, have caused the gravest chagrin to .some deceased members who were devoted to the principle that has been so ruthiessly discarded. And it is impossible to view without some feeling of scorn the cynical coolness with which the Labour members of the City Council in Christchurch, where they are in the majority, now propose to forsake the principle of election by proportional representation that was imposed by them on the city at the time when this system was in favour with their party. When James Russell Lowell placed in the mouth of an American politician the statement that A marciful Providunce fashioned us holler, . O’ purpose that we plight our principles swaller the expression was one that might be found to apply in New Zealand.