A NATIONAL PARTY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24569, 13 May 1935, Page 8

A NATIONAL PARTY

In resolving themselves into one political organisation, as they are now reported to have done, the Reform and United Parties have taken a course which they might justifiably have adopted before this. The complete fusion of the two elements which has now been effected should tend not only to increase the allegiance of the members themselves to their party, but should also enable it to show a more confident front to the country than would otherwise be the case when the general election is held towards the end of the year. The Reform and United Parties have been associated during a period of acute economic depression, and have pursued a line of action, unpopular though it may have been at times, which they believed to be in the best interests of the country. Criticism and abuse they have suffered in plenty, with a limited opportunity of vindicating their actions, and it is important, therefore, that at a time when they have a prospect of seeing valuable results from their work they should remain together —not in the temporary and rather unsatisfactory alliance which has existed during the past four years, but welded together as a pei’manent whole. There can be no argument against the fusion, especially with a general election on the horizon. It may be assumed, indeed, that it has been the imminence of the election that has brought about the formation of the National Political Federation at the present time. It would have been an act of political folly for the members of the Reform and United Parties to go to the polls as representatives of distinct political factions, since this might have been productive of internecine contests in some electorates and have involved the frustration of all the objects of their association during the past few years. The probable result would be the presentation of certain seats to the Opposition. The idea of a permanent fusion of the two parties has always been advocated less enthusiastically by members of the Reform Party than by the United Party, which, as the result of its inferior strength in the House of Representatives, would seem to have the more to gain, and Mr Coates has on various occasions expressed a personal disinclination to the extinction of the Reform Party as such, but there can be no doubt that the step that has been taken will prove eventually to be in the best interests of both parties, as it will be in the best interests also of the country. And, since there are no divergences of policy sufficiently serious to keep the two parties apart, it is difficult to see that they could reasonably have taken any action other than that upon which they have now decided.