The Daily News FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1935. NO CONFIDENCE DEBATE.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 September 1935, Page 4

The Daily News

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1935. NO CONFIDENCE DEBATE.

OFFICES: NEW PLYMOUTH. Currie Street STRATFORD, Broadway. HAWERA. High Street.

So long as “no confidence” motions remain the most spectacular method for direct and general attack upon a Government so long are they likely to be introduced by Opposition leaders in Parliament. With a general election not far away the temptation to extend and sharpen the debate which closed on Wednesday must have been present, and the House can probably congratulate itself on having recorded within a few days the conclusion that was known to be inevitable when the debate began. The way is thus cleared for the more serious business of the Session, of which the signs are a crop of amending Bills, most of which are more concerned with administrative details than with new policy. There was little to guide the electorate in the recent no-confidence debate. The Opposition accused the Government of having failed to prevent destitution among the unemployed, and having passed reactionary legislation, some of which will put the farmers of the Dominion in the position of being the “serfs” of a financial corporation not wholly under the control of the Government. It is not surprising that the Opposition found much to criticise in the record of the Government during its four years of office. The question for the electorate is not, however, whether those mistakes were made, but whether from them and its other experiences the National Government evolved a policy that has brought the Dominion safely through the years of depression experienced during its term of office. A still more important inquiry for the electorate to make is whether the Government’s policy promises a continuance of the recovery that has undoubtedly begun, or whether Labour can offer a better plan. In regard to the past the critics of the Government made no allowance for the difficulties which had to be overcome in New Zealand, as in every other civilised country, during its term of office, and in some details the criticism appears to have been as unfair as it was untrue. An instance of this was given in the debate on unemployment relief. A Labour member flourished before the House a blanket of poor quality which he alleged was the kind of article a brutal Government was prepared to issue to the unemployed as protection against the cold nights of winter. Challenged by the Minister of Employment to hand over the sample and provide the Government with the name of the individual to whom it had been issued so that inquiries could be made, the Labour critic declined to comply with this request. It is that sort of criticism which makes the Opposition’s case so unconvincing and demonstrates that political opportunism rather than statesmanship lies behind much of the blame attached to the Government and its policy. There is nothing new in this, of course, and the electorate may be trusted to assess the value of the criticism at its true worth. The most disappointing feature of the debate has been its failure to show any constructive criticism. With the exception of those made by the member for Egmont, Mr. C. A. Wilkinson, there was scarcely a suggestion that a reduction in the costs of administration and a lightening of the burden of taxation might be the soundest road to follow if the Dominion is to return to prosperity. The Labour programme is definitely one of wide expenditure by the State, an expenditure that according to one leader is to be met by currency inflation, and according to another by taxation. The whole programme of guaranteed prices and guaranteed wages and salaries calls for State expenditure. It calls also for State supervision and control of indus-

try—primary and secondary—under which the “serfdom” introduced by the Government’s mortgage relief legislation would appear the widest liberty. If this impression of the Labour programme is wrong, its supporters during the recent noconfidence debate did little to enlighten those who misunderstand them, or to convince opponents that the policy they would inaugurate is well thought out and not mere political opportunism. As one of the leaders of the new Democrat party, Mr. W. A. Veitch, the member for Wanganui, had an opportunity during the debate to enlighten the electorate upon his party’s policy. He did not embrace it, but contented himself with general criticism of the Ministry, some of which was as vitriolic as any made by the official Opposition. But if it is to win an election the Democrat party will require more than a series of upbraidings as a battle cry.