Dear Sir.

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 10, Issue 54, 25 November 1946, Page 4

Dear Sir.

Letters to the Editor must be clearly written on one side of the paper only and where a nom-de-plume is used the name of the writer must be included for reference purposes. The Editor reserves the right to abridge, amend or withhold any letter or letters.

ELECTION CAMPAIGN

Sir, —During the course of Mr W. Sullivan’s meeting at Edgecumbe on Wednesday night, he managed to paint a very klrid picture of conditions in New Zealand under what he terms the Labour Party’s rule of “Ultimate Socialism.” I was together with others, at times moved to interject by Mr Sullivan’s persistentevasion and unwillingness to face facts. Now in reply to one interjection, Mr Sullivan conjured up his pretty picture, which included a reference to our desire for the Russian system of living, and asked me if I for one wanted “Ultimate Socialism” in this country. Now, Sir, I would like the opportunity to reply through your columns. If Ultimate Socialism means for the people of New Zealand freedom from want; freedom from exploitation by vested interests and monopolies; for the working farmer—freedom from the depredations of the land speculator—for the masses—freedom from the fear of a lifetime of poverty, burdened with debt, occasioned by illness or other misfortune; freedom from soup kitchens, doss houses, slave camps, and the necessity for able bodied men and women begging cast off clothing etc.; for the mothers, freedom from the fear of their children being under-nourished and ill clad in a land of plenty, then I and thousands of other responsible citizens, not only want and believe in Ultimate Socialism, but are willing to fight for it as so many other men and women including every member of the Labour Cabinet has fought for many years. Finally Sir, despite Mr Sullivan’s loud assertions to the contrary, people did starve in this fair'land, under his party’s predecessors when they were in power. Yours etc., P. M, HAWKINS.

WHAT WILL BE LEFT US

Sir, —I notice another hymn of hate against Socialism and progress inserted by “Onlooker” in your correspondence column on 13/11/46, and an unusually muddled one at that. This may of course be a dodge of the political propaganda machine, that is drenching the country with this stuff, to confuse the electors. It is assumed, for instance, that all members of the Labour Party are. Socialists, quite contrary to facts, as many of them are simply kindly people who wish to eliminate the worst evils of Capitalism. Also State Capitalism and Socialism are treated as one system, no doubt with the same object, whereas Socialism is a natural development from co-operation and ,the enemies of Socialism always attempt to strangle co-operation. The statement that every Socialist applauded Hitler and Mussolini is a straightout well mis-statement in polite language, and to call these Fascists, who were backed by big business, Socialists, is another. All known Socialists and Communists soon found themselves in concentration camps under Hitler, while 95 per cent, of the directors of banks and business monopolies retained their positions in Germany up to the last war. Mussolini started by'ejecting workers that had taken over factories and burning down their cooperative stores. No doubt many people who believed their promises were fooled, as people are who believe promises obviously made to win elections. The Dean of Canterbury is said to have written ‘stupid nonsense” about what he saw in the U.S.S.R. Well, well, at least he wrote the truth, as anyone will discover if sufficiently interested to read what the Webbs, Violet Lansbury (Mr G.), D. N. . Pritt, Major A. .S. Hooper, Professor I. B. S. Haldane, Maurice Dobb and numerous other reliable Englishmen have to say about what they saw in Russia. These men are not in the pay of the millionaire press or big financial interests. As to the Dean of Canterbury regretting his writings, a recent article of his is headed “Anti Soviet Lies Reach a New Peak of Hate” and in it he says “Power politics are at work and the sooner we recognise it the better.”

One thing this last tirade sponsored by “Onlooker” whoever he may be, clearly shows is that this propaganda makes use of the old trick of a thief being chased, who

to deceive the crowd chases some innocent person and keeps shouting thief, thief, thief. It is pretended that the evils inherent in capitalism exist in Socialism. As to cho®sing your occupation, what opportunity have all the unemployed in the British Empire and U.S.A. got of choosing any occupation during the iodic slumps of Capitalism or for that matter those still clinging to jobs at starvation wages? In the last slump Sir John Boyd Orr’s commission found that 13 to 14 million people in England were unable to buy enough food to avoid malnutrition. The average consumption of milk in Auckland was a quarter of a pint per head, which meant that many workers children got none. A local farmer advertising for a marride couple to milk received 300 applications for the job, some applicants offering to work for their keep. According to the report of a commission appointed by the late Mr Coates, 50 per cent, of the farmers in New Zealand were insolvent. This is not a distorted picture of the future hatched in the mind of some anti-Socialist, it is what was left us by Capitalism.

Yours etc.,

C. J. HALLETT.

P.S. I am afraid I must admit that a Socialist Government would ■ direct financial assistance into approved channels. For instance it would assist the manufacture of boots, bread and clothing before gin, lipstick and jewellery.