THE MATAURA SEAT.

Otago Witness, Issue 3430, 9 December 1919, Page 26

THE MATAURA SEAT.

MR ALEX. M'LACHLAN'S ADDRESS. Tnero was a. good attendance of electors in the Mataura Town Hall on Monday, Ist insfc., to hear an address by Mr Alex. M'Lachlan, tho official LaDour onndidate for the Mataura seat- The Mayor (Mr J. Lowden) presided, and bespoke a good hearing for the candidate. . Mr M'Lachlan, who was well received, commenced by explaining his position. Ho had been unanimously chosen as the official Labour candidate for the Mataura seat. The 'position had practi'cally been forced -upon him, as he had declined nomination on many occasions, but his supporters had insisted, and that was why he was now a candidate. His reason for declining had been that he had a wife and a large family dependent upon him, end a man's first duty was to his wife and family. However, ho also owed a duty to his country, and consequently he had acceded to the wishes of organised Labour in Mataura to become a candidate for this seat. —(Applause.) It was a high honour, indeed, to be a Labour can- - dictate, and his intention was to make the people acquainted with the Labour Party's platform. Many people were under the impression that the sole aim of the Labour Pcrty was the improvement of conditions *,nd hours, of labour. This was a fallacy. The ideals of _ Labour were far nobler and grander than "that. The taproots of these ideals commenced at the foundation of our" social system, and he was confident that from these roots would be developed a social system which would- pcrmeato the whole social sphere.—(Applause.) The Labour Party was fighting against great odds.. Against the party was that powerful engine, tho press. Vested interests and tho prejudice of the people had aUo to bo overcome. The waters: Jo workers at "Wellington had recently been blackened by the press for refusing to unload coal, but their objection was not known to the general public I* was this: The coal merchants were charging £7 Ite per ton for coal in Wellington, and coal could be put on.the boats at Westport for 35s per ton. Instead of these men being criticised, they should have been praised for their action. It was evident that the enormous increase did not represent the cosfof freight and handling in Wellington. Tho middlemen wore practioally making tho difference between the cost of the coal or. the boat at Westport and the price charged tho consumer. In tho Old Country the miners had boon blamed for striking; but what brought that about? It was brought about because the owners had put 6s on to tho price of the coal. The people should not judge the Labour Party by tho attitude of a'hostile press. Ha had a good cause to uphold, and his only wish was that they had got a bettor man to carry the banner. In the Otago Witness Dr Waddoll had given a review of tho Labour platform and had spoken in eulogistic terms of it. Wall, if he was wrong in the party ho backed he, at any rate, failed in good company.—(Applause!) Howovcr, he was not afrp.id of opposition. *Sind was confident of his ultimate success. In placintr his views before tho public ho felt he had a great responsibility. The duty

of every"memper of a party was to live up to tho high ideals of that party, and this h 3 would strenuously endeavour to do. If a new party wero elected to control and administer tho affairs of the country, this much ho could say for it: It could not do worse than the National Government had done. —(Applause.) There was no necd'trr feelings ot alarm over a new party being* placed on the Treasury benches; thoy would have the assistance of the present heads of departments, and would thus bo "able to carry on the business of the country just as well as those who were endeavouring to do so to-day. Furthermore, a new party would not make a pretence of doing the work of the country; they would do it, and do it well hi. the interests of the people as a whole. —(Applause.) There -uere specal reasons why tho farmers should support tha representatives of Labour. It was absolutely essential in the interests of the producers and consumers aliko that the- farmers should *work in harmony with tho representatives of the workers. All producers were workers, and the interests of the great army of workers in this country were identical. The farmers received something like 18d a pound for their wool, but whan they went, into a shop and bo tight a pound of wool they had to pay 16s for. it. Tho difference in tho selling price and tho purchasing price was not represented in tho treatment of the raw article to make it the finished article. Who got this difference? Not tho man who produced it, nor yet those who prepared it, for the shops. It was tho big middlemen, and tho aim of his party was to cut out these middlemen. If they only succeeded in eliminating one of thesd parasites then the Labour Party would havo done some good, and-'justified its existence. —(Applause.) Tha speaker next dealt with tho butter-fat tax. which he snid should never have been imposed, and the Labour Party would not be a party to any such" system of class taxation. It had boon said that this tax would b? refunded, but he had paid £ls of tho butter-fat tax, and he had not received any return, nor was ho ever likely to. Dealing with the meat question, the candidate said the farmers had suffered in respect to this just as they had suffered in other respects. The Imperial Government now admitted that it could not give a fair price for New Zealand meat, because of the high prices paid to the American Meat Trust. From this question Mr M'Lachlan passed on to the wheat question. lie criticised the action of the Government in subsidising tho flour millers on the tonnage basis for all flour produced. The Dunedin • miilers, after receiving their subsidy, had reduced the price of flour 10s per ton, and if they could clo that then thev could n.'ve done it before, and consequently thero was | no need for the subsidy. If after the treatment they had received from the Government tho farmers voted for their return to power, then, all he could say was that they deserved whatever treatment was meted 1 "out to them. —(Applause.) A great deal had been said about the price of bread being fixed, but what was the actual cft.j.'t of this? He had been informed by a ba!o-r that his -business was paying better io-day than ever it had clone. The bakers were making a profit of 2d per loaf on br-sad, whereas formerly t,Hoy had only profited to the extent of a halfpenny per loaf. Theso

were questions for the farmers as well as the people generally to consider, and he had no doubt whatever as to what their do cision would be. —(Applause.) The Lfftlici'r i'ariy advocated the elimination of all sva.+e and the utilisation of all 4>y-product3 ,wni:h meant that industries would flourish, and a period ot prosperity unprecedented in the p.n:story of tnis country would be established. The candidate next referred to trie treatment of returned soldiers. He aumhreJ. that this was a somewhat delicate matter to deal with, because of the possibility'of buitig misunderstood. The man who would take advantage of the war for political ptu'pj-.es was indeed a mean man, but it was an established fact that while every encouragement was given to men to enlist, they were not being treated fairly now that they had Speaking particularly with reference to the soldiers' settlement scheme of ! the Government, Mr M'Lachlan said that in many instances men were being placed on land that they would never be able to work successfully. With respect to the gratuity, he said the Government had decided to pay the men Is 6d per day, representing* in round figures something like£6,ooo,ooo payable to all those who rendered the Empire such signal service during the* late war. Now, what was £6,000,000. when they knew that the war profits had amounted to something like £100,000,000? Personally he would prefer to call the gratuity by some other name. At a meeting held,at Dunedin recently soldiers' grievances had been ventilated. It appeared that the Government was discharging men and giving them a pension. They previously received 9s or 10s per day, but the pension only amounted to about 22s per week. It was not right that these men should be discharged if they were not fit.— (Applause.) Mr M'Lachlan went on to speak of the party leaders' visits to the Homeland, during which time they had left New Zealand to the tender mercies of Sir James Allen. He had never previously admired Sir James Alien, but he had to admit that if there was one man in the Government who had come through the war period with credit, that man was Sir James Allen. (Applause.) Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward had gone Home on the invitation of the Imperial Government, but he was of opinion that' they had no right to leave New Zealand at such a critical period. The Hon. R. Heaton-Rhorles and the High Commissioner (Sir Thos. Mackenzie) could have ably represented the dominion at Home. It occurred to him that it was just nossible that Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward had abused the privileges that their position in thf Government gave them, and that personal ambition and jealousy were responsible for both of them going to England. Mr W. Downie Stewart, possibly one of the clearest thii.kers in the House, had said that the leaders were carrying on a sham fight, but Mr Stewart had been generous enough not to include in this statement the Labour Party. If it were true that a sham fight were being carried on, then all he (the speaker) could say w r as that it was a disgraceful trick to side-track the Labour Party. Labour would not bs side-tracked, as he was confident the public would see through the scheme.—(Applause.) j The candidate made passing reference to New Zealand's inter.&st in Nauru Island. He said that when Mr Massey was ques-

tioned regarding the Peace Conference he had replied: "I regard it as satisfactory from New Zealand s point of view We managed to secure an interest in the valuable phosphate deposits on Nauru Island." Mr M'Lachlan said, that according to an article written by _Mr Stead, shipping con- ; ditions alone would make it an' impossible proposition from the dominion's standpoint, and we would find that instead of Deing an asset, Nauru Island would be one of the biggest i white elephants ever foisted on the public.—(Applause.) * • Mr M'Lachlan, after making passing reference to the high cost of living, which I he said required the closest investigation, i passed on to deal with the platform of the party he was supporting. He said they might consider it idealistic and almost Utopian, but they would at least concede that-it was humanitarian. They were advocating proportional representation, which proposal had been so well ventilated that ! ho did not consider it necessary to dwell 1 upon it. He did not think that it would do all that was required, but he was satisj fied to give it a fair trial. They would I also advocate the recall and the referendum. j The latter plank they were familiar with, but the recall was a new idea, afnd meant ' that the constituents wore given the right to recall their member should he go back on his election pledges. .This, he contended, was entirely just and reasonable. Tho abolition of the Legislative Council was another thing they would strive for. He believed it was a farce. Mr Massey had said that he was going to reform it; but instead he had stuffed it with his own nominees. As at present constituted it was simply an aristocratic old-age pension scheme. —(Laughter.) It was his belief that a-better" method would be to appoint some half dozen men of tho calibre of, say, Sir Robert Stout,-the Chief Justice—men whose legal knowledge and ability would be of infinite value—and pay them a good salary, and so make them independent. This would do away with'the present objectionable dual Chamber—(Applause.) He favoured strongly the granting of full civic rights to civil servants, because ho felt that it would be a good thing. At present some of the giant intellects of New Zealand were in the civil service, and they should be placed on the same footing and enjoy the same rights as others. —(Applause.) His party was advocating the nationalisation of Crown lands, but he thought it would be better to let people on to such lands on any tenure they liked. At present most of them harboured noxious weeds, etc., 'and by any means ho would get them settled. He believed Mr Massey owed his position to what might be called the freehold gag. Ho had frisrhtened the Crown tenants into voting for his party, under the pretext that the Liberals were going to interfere with the State's contract with tenants on Crown lands. As a matter of fact, such a thing had never been thought of. The Labour Party realised that the contract between the State and the individual must be held sacred. There w-as absolutely nothing in the bogey freehold v. leasehold. No matter what tenure a man held land under, the State had the right to tax him. The candidate's opinion of the Labour Party's State farm scheme was that it was purely a local movement, for the purpose of producing food for State institutions. Ho did not think it was tho

intention of the Labour Tarty to nationalise the whole of the land at the present time. This might come later pij. Discussing the question of State ownership of banking institutions, the candidate said he believed that a State bank, would be an accomplished thing in the near future. Sir Joseph Ward was' in favour of it. But the Labour Party would not advocate it on tho lines suggested by him —viz., by buying out tho Bank of New Zealand. He believed , it could bo done along the lines adopted ' by; the Austrabah Government, which had found that, through its bank, it eoutd float a loan at a cost of 4s 6'd per cent., where before it used to cost £2 7s per cent. 7 Mr M'Lachian next dealt with the question of a State-owned shipping service. This was a matter that tho Government should have tackled long ago. The Commonwealth Government, had bought a fleet, and it had paid for itself over and over again. Ho understood that the Union Company's fleet could have been bought at the beginning of the war for £3,000.000. If that had been done, instead of costing the Government £6,000,000, as it had done, they could allow £3,000,000 for expenses and still havo the fleet to show for it. . Continuing, he said that Sir Joseph Ward proposed to nationalise the coalmining industry of New Zealand, but he had grave | doubts about tin's course being effective in solving the Labour question, so far as the , coal business was concerned. I Proportional representation and the reduction of the taxation paid by those, least able to bear it were questions favoured by the candidate, who also advocated tho nationalisation of the medical and dental professions o f "the dominion. He also favoured the improvement of cur State educational system in the direction of providI ing free the books used- by the scholars in the schools. What we wanted to instil in | the children of tho country was a humanitarian spirit, and les3. of the Jingoistic There were tremendous possibilities in the development of hydroelectrical energy, and this should be encour- ' aged in every way. He was opposed to the Military Service Act, and would support : any motion for its repeal. The great war had been fought to end wars, and we should let the world see that we were sinj cere by laying down our arms.—(" Hear, I hear.") If wo attended now. to the build- ; ing up of the physique of our young man- ' hood we would find that if tho time came i that they were wanted for war service wo I could make just as good soldiers of them j in the three months' training as could ba | done in the years spent, under the present 1 system. Ho- would say: Don't tinker with a 1 toy navy for service round the coasts of j New Zealand, but pay a fair share of the I expense of protecting our shores to the British navy.—(Applause.) The meeting apparent!}' was satisfied with the candidate's address, and no questions ware asked, and he was accorded a hearty vote of thanks and confidence on the motion of Mr Carrolh