MR ALLEN HITS BACK

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23492, 5 May 1938, Page 8

MR ALLEN HITS BACK

ANSWERS TO CRITICISM MR COX'S CHARGES REFUTED COMMENTARY BENEATH CONTEMPT " I have been well shot at from all angles, I suppose, because until Tuesday evening I was the only candidate opposed to Labour interests who had been addressing meetings," said Mr A. H. Allen, candidate for the mayoralty in opposition to the Rev. E. T. Cox, in his address at Tainui last evening. "In fact, criticism of me has been so free that I have deferred my reply to it. There were one or two statements by Labour candidates on Tuesday evening, however, that can be dealt with briefly. For example, Mr Cox was reported to have said at Woodhaugh: 'lt is a strange commentary on human frailty that men who are reputably honest should have so little regard for truth or honesty when they aspire to public office.' "Beneath Contempt" " I don't want to say much about that," Mr Allen continued. "It must be admitted even by my opponents that so far I have been fighting a clean fight. If that remark was addressed to me personally, I say merely that it is beneath contempt. I leave it at that." —(Applause.) Mr Cox had quoted " an opponent of the.Labour Party" as saying that in the past three years the steady reduction in the trading departments' profits had been causing concern, but, as often happened with him, Mr Cox had not dealt with his (Mr Allen's) figures. " What I did," he said, " was to show a comparison by adding the total expenditure in the municipal account and trading accounts as follows: 1935 1938 £ £ Municipal account 190,131 289,403 Trading departments .. .. 477,841 581,603 Totals .. £667,972 £871,006 " That shows that we incurred an additional expenditure of £203,034 for a smaller net profit of £4097. Those figures are accurate and can be checked. The " Mythical Million " "Then Mr Cox talked of 'possibly the most ludicrous of all the claims, the statement made by the candidate about the mythical million of debt.' He quoted the amounts borrowed by the council and the proposed borrowings, and said it had not been mentioned that the proposed £IOO,OOO for road improvements had already been turned down by a ratepayers' poll. Well," Mr Allen continued, " I did say that this proposed loan had been turned down. I stated that the expenditure incurred and contemplated amounted to £600,000, and that if it were not checked, this might go on to £1,000,000. I don't think that was too rash a statement." Mr Allen next dealt with some criticism by Mr M. Silverstone—- " That this year the council was paying £2500 a week more in wages than Mr Allen and his Tory council could do, and Mr Allen could not understand where the money could be found. There was plenty more where that came from." That money was coming from the renewal funds and from nowhere else, Mr Allen commented. " Pettifogging Interference " "The members of the old council never governed; they were the servants of the administrative staff and " while the Labour council is in power, the staff will do as it is told " were other of Mr Silverstone s statements at South Dunedin that Mr Allen discussed. " This disciplining of the staff is simply petifoggmg interference with the Town Hall staff by councillors, and it has to be stopped," he said. The result of it was discontent in the different departments, and he said that Mr Silverstone recently took it upon himself to go past the town clerk and the city treasurer to hold an inquiry into a staff dispute. " He actually held an inquiry and had a member of the staff in to give a statement," he said. "It is all an extraordinary undermining of the authority of the council's responsible officers." .