EXTREMISTS CONDEMNED.

Taranaki Daily News, 25 September 1920, Page 10

EXTREMISTS CONDEMNED.

Labor premier hits out, WILD AND LAWLESS SCHEMES. 1 Sidney, Aug 1 . 24. For a considerable time there has been a likelihood of a definite breach between the moderate and extreme sections of the Labour Party in this State; and the threat of trouble has not been at all removed by the outspoken statement of the Labour Premier, Mr. John Storey, this week. Mr. Storey is a man of sane and moderate views, who bebelieves in constitutional action as against revolution. His relationship with, the Prince of Wales was interesting and amusing. They met each other with obvious mutual suspicions and 'uneasiness. Mr. Storey apparently felt that there was nothing between hire, as a leader of advanced democracy, and the Prince, the representative of aristocracy. The Prince, just .as obviously, did not know what reception he Was going to get from the head of ii party which, notoriously, includes some rampant revolutionaries and disloyalists. They ended up by becoming the warmest friends possible—and it is a genuine friendship, each man appreciating the manly, human qualities of the other. The Prince. to ld r a private gathering in Sydney that the Labour Premier was "the most likeable Bolshevik he had ever met."

Mr. Storey, however, has been embarrassed ever since taking office by ths activities of his noisy extremist* friends.' They have been making of themselves a greater and greater public nuisance; and lately, since the release of their I.W.W. friends, they have put no check on their perfervid oratory. Last Sunday, in the Domain, they "cut loose" completely, and threatened the community and the Empire with blood and revolution. Some of the newspapers published an extensive report of some of these wild speeches, and Mr. Storey deemed it necessary to make a statement. He referred first of all to certain resolutions in favour of a "go-slow" strike against deportations, the other day by the Sydney Labour Council. This body has- been captured by the extremists, and is trying to make the Labour Government do its bidding." Mr. Storey points out that the deportations are ended. "As for the 'go-slow' resolutions, they are equally to be disregarded. Does Mr. Garden (leader of the extremists), an ex-Methodist rnininster, by the way, think for a moment that industrious men on piece-work s ire going to reduce tlieir incomes just to accommodate the fancies of liis disordered brain? I have great faith in the working man of Australia, and I do not thing he will allow himself to be led astray by wild and lawless schemes As for the wild and fantastic outpourings of Mr. Donald Grant, I repudiate them utterly, and I think it can also be said that they are the negation of the feeling of the Australian Labour Party. I think Mr. Grant must have found prison a very snug and habitable place, and that his outbursts are due to a state of frenzy because his friends would not let him stay there, I shall not place difficulties in Mr. Grant's way if he wants to return. A man who delights in blood, dreams of blood, talks blood, and wants to wallow in blood, can always be aceomjnodated at the expense of the State" Which is practically an open challenge from the leader of the moderates to the restless extremists.