The Christchurch Star PUBLISHED BY New Zealand Newspapers Ltd. Gloucester Street and Cathedral Square CHRISTCHURCH NEW ZEALAND. TUESDAY, JULY 3, 1934. MR SULLIVAN AS PROPHET.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20374, 3 July 1934, Page 6

The Christchurch Star PUBLISHED BY New Zealand Newspapers Ltd. Gloucester Street and Cathedral Square CHRISTCHURCH NEW ZEALAND.

TUESDAY, JULY 3, 1934. MR SULLIVAN AS PROPHET.

London Representatives r R. B. BRETT & SON NEW BRIDGE HOUSE, 30/34 NEW BRIDGE STREET, LONDON, E.C.4.

TJ' XPEDIENCY, which in ethics makes right subservient to self-interest, may or may not have influenced the delegates to the National Labour Conference yhen they struck P.R. out of their platform. Many of them, like several of the City Councillors who spoke on the subject last night, could not have understood its operation, or at any rate the principle underlying it, but others must have understood the principle quite well and voted against it as a matter of expediency. Perhaps we should not be too hard upon them for that, because even Mr D. G. Sullivan, in his early appeals for the adoption of P.R. at a time when Labour was in a very decided minority on the council, issued a clear warning that the time would come when the ; worst features of the first-past-the-post system would favour his party, and then the other side might be glad of a system that would give them the full representation to which they were entitled. As far as electoral figures go, that position has almost arrived in Christchurch city. We have seen the City Council very evenly divided between Labour and anti-Labour forces under P.R., with a bare majority for Labour created solely by the election of a Labour Mayor, but there is reason to believe that if the Independents, Dr Thacker, Mr Evans and Mr Armstrong, could have been eliminated between the upper and the nether millstone of party tickets under the old voting system, their places would have been filled by Labour candidates, and this view is strengthened by the fact that at the tramway election, under the first-past-the-post system. Labour got seven seats to the Citizens’ Association’s one.- A more V alert antiLabour opposition, therefore, would have appreciated these facts instead of tamely following Councillor Thurston in his motion for repeal, for on tactics Labour is a jump ahead of them. But a warning should be offered to all parties that the intelligence of the public in a simple matter touching the public interest is a jump ahead in turn of those who oppose or abandon electoral reform, and intelligent constituencies are not to be trifled with in matters of such grave moment.

NOT UNDERSTOOD. Councillor Evans stated ” last" night that he had come prepared to repeal P.R., but after hearing the arguments for repeal had decided against repeal, he was taking the common-sense view, for the discussion bristled with absurdities, which reached their peak when Councillor T. Andrews declared that a vote under P.R. was practically lost after the third preference was reached. What he really meant was that the value of the vote had been fully exercised with the third preference, but he wanted “ to have a say in regard to every candidate who was standing.” Well, we are all human enough to enjoy the pleasure of striking out with a very black pencil the names of persons for whom we do not wish to vote, but this state of mind is traceable to a Mussolini complex, which, if it had its way, would refuse any representation to the other side. It exists in a lively state in men like Councillor M. E. Lyons, who is aghast at the possibility that “ 1600 cranks could secure direct representation on the council.” As a matter of fact, Councillor Lyons doubtless regards all Labourites as cranks, and the truth is that everybody is a bit cranky. But why let one lot of cranks have all the say?