SPEECHES CRITICISED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19315, 4 May 1937, Page 2

SPEECHES CRITICISED

LABOUR LEADERS DEPLORED BY*MR. COBBE "Recent public utterances by prominent members of the Labour Party are of a "most disquieting nature," said the Hon. iT. G. (Jobbe in an address in Feildiiig. "The Rev. Clyde Can*, then national president of the New Zealand Labour" Party, speaking in Tiifiaru on December 2 'uttered a deliberate threat that certain persons occupying important public positions would, to, use his own words, 'be sent, down the road.' This ■was apparently a threat that unless the Judge of the Arbitration Court carries out the wishes of the unions he might he transferred.

"Arid if the public, works engineers insist upon greater efficiency than the unions approve of. thou the engineers may lose their jobs. In other words, public officials, placed in important judicial arid .administrative positions, .are warned that justice and efficiency are not profitable. "A leading newspaper has. very correctly, described this Speech as a general menace to freedom. a in! :i Step to\ nrd-t

dictatorship. i •Theie is little doubt. that inflammatory speeches, such as 1 have referred to. lead to trouble. The deliancc of authority and the serious loss to farmers through the •recent- unjustifiable Auckland strike, probably would never have oceurred if the strikers had not felt sure that they had behind them the support of persons occupying important public positions, and further, that no matter what- loss was suffered by innocent people, no'serious action would be taken bv a Socialistic Government.

"The fact must be recognised that even with its big majority, the present Government does not govern New Zealand. The Auckland strike shows plainly, that New Zealand—it primary producing country —is governed by city trade unions, from .whom the Government takes orders. If the unions do not agree, with the deliberate judgment of a (Joint of Law, the Government will alter the law ifo suit them."