PROTEST BY PRESBYTERY

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19454, 13 October 1937, Page 12

PROTEST BY PRESBYTERY

STOPPING OF BROADCAST TALK PROM 13 STATION NEW STATE CONTROL (Per Press Association.) AUCKLAND, last night. A letter from the director of broadcasting, Professor James Shelley, was read to the Auckland Presbytery to-night, stating that since the Government had taken over the control of station IZM at Manurewa, it would not be possible to reinstate the weekly talks that the Presbyterian Church had previously been broadcasting from there. The director said that if they accepted talks from the Presbyterian Church, they would have to extend similar privileges to other churches. The Rev. J. A. Allan, convener of the presbytery's committee, said they quite admitted that, but there was no reason why the time the Presbyterian Church had previously had should not still be devoted to religious subjects, divided up among the churches, on the same principle on which their time was now divided on the main national stations. If they could agree about that without quarrelling, they could surely do so'over the time on B stations. If the director's letter was the last word, it meant that the outcome of the Government's policy was to cut down the lime available for religious purposes. A resolution was adopted asking that the time previously at the disposal of the Presbyterian Church be put at the disposal of the various churches for religious purposes, and urging the Government to see to it that its purchase of the B stations did not involve any curtailment of the total time available on the air for religious purposes.