Communists Denounce Labour Party Leaders

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26780, 25 May 1948, Page 6

Communists Denounce Labour Party Leaders

P.A. WELLINGTON, May 24. After the establishment of Communism in New Zealand and Australia “ very severe steps ” would be taken to ensure that “ some alleged Labour politicians ” performed “an honest day’s work for the first time in many years,” Mr Claude Jones, Queensland State president of the Communist Party informed a public meeting in the Trades Hall last night.

Attacks on Mr Fraser, Mr Semple. Labour Party leaders in Britain and Australia, and Mr Semple’s booklet “ Why I Fight Communism ” were made by Mr Jones and Mr Victor G. Wilcox, of Auckland, national organiser of the Communist Party. Claiming that detractors of Communism came “ either from the silken sheets of the rich or the renegade ranks of the Labour movement," Mr Jones said that New Zealand newspapers had taken up “a book by one Semple” and had used it as a cultural contribution. No doubt some people wpuld use Mr Semple’s writings as a bible, but Mr Semple really joined hands with “ that Holly Wood clothes horse, Robert Taylor,” who had also spoken of his abhorrence of Communism. Mr Wilcox said “the Semples and Frasers ” were on trial instead of Communism. He accused the Labour Party leaders of “ collaborating with the employers, with the Churchills and Trumans and Hollands and Doidges.” By doing so, he said, the Labour Government would inevitably be defeated, although the Communists would be blamed.