BULLER BY-ELECTION.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 911, 4 November 1933, Page 8

BULLER BY-ELECTION.

Support Given Mr Webb at Wallsend. (Special to the ” Star.”) GREYMOUTH, November 3. The United Mine Workers’ executive is still firm in its opposition to the candidature of the official Labour nominee for the Buller seat, Mr P. C. Webb. Messrs F. Langstone and R. Semple, M.P.’s, .last evening addressed a meeting of electors at the Wallsend Hall in support of the candidature of Mr Webb. Mr J. Smeaton, Mayor of Brunner, presided. Both speakers were accorded an attentive hearing. Applause was frequent and no questions were asked. There was a large attendance. At the concluusion, Mr W. Purdy proposed and Mr Cosgrove seconded a resolution tendering a hearty vote of thanks for the interesting and instructive addresses, and re-affirming the confidence of the meeting in the New Zealand Labour Party. The vote was carried by acclamation. Mr Langstone addressed a meeting at Runanga this evening, his subject being “The Financial Policy of the Labour Party.” Mr Semple will speak at Waiuta on Sunday afternoon and at Reefton on Sunday evening, while Mr Langstone will give an address at the Town Hall, Greymouth, on Sunday evening. Mr Langstone and Mr Semple, jointly interviewed to-day, said they had definitely stated that Mr Webb would not be withdrawn at the previous conference with Mr M’Lagan. At a meeting of unionists at Runanga it had been decided to endorse the running of a separate candidate if Mr Webb remained the official choice of the Labour Party, but Mr Langstone said that only 50 or 60 of the membership of 350 attended, and the decision was not representative. A further meet, ing would be held at Runanga on Sunday. Mr Langstone said that at the conference with the miners’ executive he had stated that there had been no different procedure in selecting Mr Webb from that followed at Lyttelton or any other by-election. He said he was convinced that the opposition was not coming from the rank and file of the miners, but from a few officials who could be counted on the fingers of both hands. At the meetings he had addressed, Mr Webb had had always an enthusiastic hearing. No vestige of organised opposition could be noticed. “It had been admitted,” said Mr Langstone, “ that there was no objection to Mr Webb standing for any constituency other than Buller, and the Labour Party held that if Mr W r ebb could- stand anywhere else there was nothing to bar him in Buller. No protest had been entered against Mr Webb until ten days after his candidature was announced. After the first meeting of the Buller Labour Representation Committee, the headquarters of the party had been advised that the Buller committee would support wholeheartedly the candidate the national executive putTorward. “We are going to fight,” concluded Mr Langstone, “ and the onus of causing trouble is not on us.”