A FARMERS’ PARTY?

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19376, 14 July 1937, Page 5

A FARMERS’ PARTY?

BALANCE OF POWER PROPOSAL AT CONFERENCE THE PRESIDENT’S DOUBTS (Special to the Herald.) WELLINGTON, this day. A proposal that a farmers’ political party Should contest Parliamentary seats for the purposes of holding the balance of power in the Government was discussed at the annual conference of the Farmers’ Union, which opened to-day.

The president, Mr. W. Mulholland, in his‘opening address, referred to costs rising against farmers and the prospect of socialistic legislation interfering with the producers’ incomes.

“The intricacies and difficulties of the situation to-day,” he said, “demand that the union shall, within the next 12 months, seriously consider its relation to politics. While the Farmers’ Union has always maintained a non-party political attitude, it has been intensely political, and has been closely connected with the various proposals that have come before Parliament from time to time.

"Up to the present, there has been no great difficulty in maintaining such an atttude, and I do not think that we need anticipate any insuperable difficulty in the future, but it is necessary to look at the political situation frankly. “A Vital Plank”

“A vital plank in our platform is the opposition to socialism, and by socialism I do not mean social betterment, for which that term is frequently used, but State ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange. So far the present Government has not taken any action which can be stated to be definitely socialistic in the true sense, nevertheless it is of extreme significance that probably its most powerful supporting organisation, the National Labour Federation, has as the central plank in its platform, the socialisation of the common ownership and control of the means and instruments of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth. “With such a vital part of our policy involved and, in the event of the Government adopting socialism, diametrically opposed to the whole Government policy, a non-party attitude would admittedly be difficult. I believe that both the Labour Party and the National Party would be relieved at the moment to find a Farmers Party in the field. It would relieve them of the necessity of having to find a policy attractive to farmers and at the same time placate their more extreme followers, and would immediately result in the respective policies moving further to the left and to the right.

“After the election both parties would bargain for the support of the Farmers’ Party. The necessity lor this bargaining would afford ample excuse for the jettisoning of their more extreme planks by either party. So that they would be free to put as attractive a programme before the electors as they could think of without the risk of having to carry its more extreme elements out. Under these circumstances the Farmers Party would have the choice of becoming the Right Wing of the Labour Party or the Left Wing of the National Party with a prospective influence on policies out of all proportion to its strength. Support From Farmers

“This position obtains in. several British countries, notably in Australia, and at first sight is attractive, but we must remember that as a political party we would have to put forward a complete platform, not only dealing with those matters that farmers were vitally interested in. “While we, as a non-party organisation, can count on the support of perhaps 90 per cent of farmers on those matters which particularly concern them there would be such a considerable division of opinion on other points of policy that I doubt if a Farmers’ Party could, even with the most careful selection of a platform, command the support of 50 per cent of the farmers, and the others would be actively hostile. “Notwithstanding the advantage that holding the balance of power gives I am of the opinion that the non-party attitude enables the farmers to exert more influence on political policies. While I do not expect that the present Government will adopt a socialistic policy, and while I also believe that a very large majority even of their supporters are opposed to such a policy, we must remember that the leaders of the trade unions movement are practically all socialists, and that they have at their hand a very efficient organisation, so that it will be necessary for us to be equally well organised, and to be equally aggressive, if we are to resist their efforts.”