NEW PLYMOUTH SEAT

Taranaki Daily News, 18 October 1934, Page 4

NEW PLYMOUTH SEAT

MR. ROBERTS FOR LABOUR OUTSTANDING MAN IN MOVEMENT. STEP TOWARDS LABOUR’S UNITY. POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL. (By Wire—Parliamentary Reporter.) Wellington, Last Night. It is understood Mr. James Roberts, secretary of the New Zealand Alliance of Labour and vice-president of the New Zealand Labour Party, will contest the New Plymouth seat at the next general election in opposition to the sitting Government member, Mr. S. G. Smith, who is chairman of committees.in the present House of Representatives. Mr. Roberts is one of the outstanding figures in the industrial labour movement in the Dominion, and has not hitherto sought political honours. Significance attaches to Mr. Roberts’ candidature in that it represents a further step towards the unity of the industrial and political sections of Labour. Mr. Roberts has had a long experience as an advocate of Labour’s cause and is a practised public speaker. Leader of the Labour delegation to the national industrial conference of 1928, Mr. Roberts was acknowledged as one of the dominating personalities at that gathering. He was a member of the unemployment committee which first advised the Government on the problem in New Zealand, and he went to Geneva as New Zealand delegate to the International Labour Conference. Mr. Roberts has also travelled extensively in other countries and has a first-hand knowledge of world economic problems.