COMMUNIST EXCESSES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26781, 26 May 1948, Page 6

COMMUNIST EXCESSES

NO TOLERATION IN DOMINION CONTRARY TO NATIONAL SPIRIT P.A. ' WELLINGTON, May 25. ■“I believe'that Mr Jones will discover he was never more seriously in error if he thinks that Communist excesses will be tolerated in this land,” declared Mr Semple to-day, replying to remarks mad£ at the week-end by Mr Claude Jones, president of the Queensland Communist Party. Mr Semple said that for the second time within a year New Zealand had had the dubious pleasure of the presence of a visitor who seemed to think he was entitled to tell New Zealanders what to do and what fate lay in store for political leaders who displeased him and his organisation. Last year’s visitor was Mr Eliot V. Elliott, secretary of the Australian Seamen’s Union and also a Communist. • Mr Semple said Mr Jones had done a service for which the ordinary run of Communists would not thank him by tearing the mask away from the Communist physiognomy. His reference to “ very severe steps ” which would be taken against opponents of Communism when Communism was established in Australia and New Zealand could have only one interpretation —that he advocated terrorism. “I consider that he promises a Czechoslovakia in New Zealand and Australia, but Mr Jones can know' very little of the temper of real Australians and New Zealanders if he thinks they will submit to the Communist noose, the firing squad and the concentration camp,” he added. What Mr Jones had said had vindicated the speaker’s action in publishing his booklet exposing the Communist conspiracy, he stated. The 10,000 copies were sold in a day or so, and another 10,000 would now be printed.