WARTIME CONTROLS

Southland Times, Issue 25550, 19 December 1944, Page 2

WARTIME CONTROLS

Sir, —At a meeting of the North Invercargill branch of the New Zealand Labour Party on Saturday night the Hon. T. F. Doyle, M.L.C., was reported as saying: “The National Party and its leader, Mr S. G. Holland, had been condemning on every platform in New Zealand the war regulations and controls saying they were unnecessary, irksome and iniquitous . . . and that when the National Party became the Government it would abolish the controls and give, back to the people their freedom.” This sweeping statement is so obviously untrue that one wonders why Mr Doyle bothers to make it, particularly as the National Party’s attitude is contained in the next paragraph of Mr Doyle’s remarks. Not one of the National members of Parliament has stated that wartime regulations and controls are unnecessary. On the contrary, all agree that certain controls are necessary in wartime. Of the seven speakers who took part in the Awarua by-election, not one made the statement Mr Doyle suggests. However, Mr Algie at Bluff did say, “The Labour Party seems to like control, they appear to know its value as a means to securing political power. The National Party regarded control as a means to an end justified only so long as it served the welfare of the community.” Perhaps Mr Doyle could give us an authentic report of a meeting at which a National member made the statements he refers to, remembering that he spoke of controls and not a political control. The National Party are not against wartime controls, but they object to the war being used as a cloak for some controls that have nothing to do with the war, and also with controls (e.g. import control) introduced prior to the war. Labour, relying on the public’s short memory, now hopes that it has forgotten that these were not introduced during the war. There is naturally concern with the way some are administered—generally with political bias—e.g. the Huntly store: extra butter for miners, but not for expectant mothers. NATIONAL.