Mr Fraser: Flag-Bearer

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVI, Issue 23029, 21 October 1944, Page 4

Mr Fraser: Flag-Bearer

IT will be an incentive to staunch 1 district efforts in future war loans for the people to know that the Freyberg Flag for the district topping the list will always be presented by the Prime Minister in person. Last year Nelson led the Dominion. Mr Fraser went to Nelson and handed over the flag. This year Southland was supreme, so the Prime Minister, having created the precedent, could not resist the claim of Invercargill for a personal visit. Perhaps a good national leader should not make a habit of delegating his powers, but in this case he could, without affront to the generous and patriotic people of Southland, have got a distinguished servicemen or even a minor Minister to have discharged this pleasant social duty. After all, the Prime Minister has had to travel far during the war years and he would have an excellent excuse for husbanding his energy for the faithful discharge of duties more important than the presentation of a flag to a province. Perhaps an alternative arrangement less exacting for the Prime Minister might have been made but for the fact that a by-election is pending in Southland and Mr Fraser, according to Mr Nash, is to give the people of Winton an “account of the Government’s stewardship.” Io pul the position more plainly, the Prime Minister has been sent on an electioneering trip by the Labour Party. He will attempt to sway the electors in an election which will not make the slightest difference one way or the other to the Government or the Opposition. The Government would like to win a seat from the National Party, a seat which has not been so carefully tended during the past five years because its occupant, the late Brigadier Hargest, was on more hazardous public duty elsewhere. Leaders of the Government have had many chances to give an “account of their stewardship” in Parliament during the past three month; they have done so through the daily Press of the Dominion, and they have done

so on the air. The people of Winton, therefore, at best will be treated to a twice-told tale, and whether the telling of it is worth a journey of more than 1000 miles by the leader of a country at war is open to serious question.