A WAIHI MEETING.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 78, 8 May 1914, Page 5

A WAIHI MEETING.

MR M'COMBS EXPLAINS.

In addressing a meeting in the Druids' Hall, Woolston, last evening, Mr J. M'Combs, M.P. for Lyttelton, made reference to his recent tour of the North Island,-and particularly to the address which lie gave in Waihi. The Press Association, he said, had thought fit to report only his Waihi meeting, and in this case it had given a most garbled account of what had happened. He had been honoured in being asked to address the first meeting held in the Waihi Miners' Hall after the Supreme Court had deoreed that it should be returned to the Federation Union. The new unionists, who had been dispossessed by the Supreme Court judgment, felt rather sore over it, and they attempted to prevent, by intimidation, a meeting being held in the hall. That attempt was quite unsuccessful. Soon after the meeting started these, men, who would not enter at first, went in and grouped together in a part of the hall. Some of them attempted to prevent the speaker from being heard, and the police were induced to take action, only after vigorous protests had made by the Mayor of Waihi, who presided, and who named some of the obstructionists and demanded that the police should do their duty and remove the men who were interfering with the meeting.

The attitude of the Mayor, and the indignation expressed by the majority of the audience, went on Mr M'Combs, broke down the tactics of those who had tried to deny the right of free speech to the Social-i>emocrat. It was the most successful meeting that he (Mr M'Comhft) had addressed while on tour, and the jicxt day he received expressions of appreciation from numbers of business men. Mr Power, who was called a'' Red Fed'' by the obstructionists in the hall, was, in spite of theiropposition, re-elected Mayor with a 25 per cent, majority. The Press Association agent in Waihi had failed to send to any of the South Island papers a notification that Mr Power had been reelected.