PRESS CENSORSHIP

Otago Witness, Issue 3510, 21 June 1921, Page 29

PRESS CENSORSHIP

IS IT DESIRABLE? STATEMENT BY SIR FRANCIS BELL. ’WELLINGTON, June 16. The extent to which Government by edict is being continued by the Cabinet so Jong after the termination of the war, is causing some uneasiness among their friends and supporters here. The latest case in point is the provision for a censorship of cablegrams regarding the views of Ministers of the Crown on any Imperial question affecting any problem conn ected with the association of the United Kingdom and New Zealand in peace or war. Sir Francis Ilell, the Acting Prime (Minister, has made a statement: At tho present time, he said, it was very desirable that a report of the statement of a responsible Minister should be submitted to him before being transmitted for publication in England or foreign countries. The tension created by the war was not yet finished, and it was hoped, whether the power existed or not, that correspondents of the press would comply with the very reasonable request that they should submit to tho Minister concerned the report of his statements which they proposed to send to England or foreign countries. A LABOUR PROTEST. CHRISTCHURCH, June 17. Messrs D. G. Sullivan, E. J. Howard, and J. M'Combs, M.P.’s, sent the _ following telegram to Sir Francis Bell (Acting Prime Minister): — “As members of Parliament we wish to protest most emphatically against the action of the Government in usurping the lawmaking functions of Parliament. Ministers are not above Parliament, and not above the law, and it is not within the right of Cabinet to issue orders censoring the transmission of news beyond the dominion. With Mr Massey in London boasting about our prosperity and telling the people about the record surplus of six millions, and that we have millions more as reserves, it would be awkward for a cable message to be transmitted from New Zealand stating, on the authority of the Acting Minister of Finance, that there is an empty Treasurybut the right way to avoid contradictions is to tell the truth. Our point, however, is that we members of Parliament are the _ lawmakers, and have made no law permitting this censorship. Cabinet has no authority to censor press news, and cannot obtain authority except from Parliament, including ourselves.”