REFORM AND FUSION.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20100, 2 December 1930, Page 15

REFORM AND FUSION.

TO THE BDITOB or TUB PBIBS Sir,—The little dialectical battle between Mr Howard and myself is ending, I fear, in something like an anticlimax. My honourable opponent entered the lists breathing forth threatenings. In homelier language he came trailing his coat, and looking for trouble, yet when, greatly daring, I ventured to take up liis challenge, he, after ;i few passes, lowers his point, and speaks sweetly—liko Byron's Lambro, "As mild a mannered man, as ever scuttled ship or cut a throat." As to whether I use a pseudonym or not, doe.s it matter? I shall always, in any Press controversy in which I take part, be willing to follow the high standard which, we learn from Mr Howard, prevails in tho august House of Parliament, and "attack the matter . . . and not the individual who brings the matter forward. " 1 am sorry that political controversy compels one on occasion to speak witli uncompromising directness, and that the occasion is here now, constraining me to say what my opponent may not liko. I would say then that as Mr Howard has proceeded in this little epistolary debate, his statements have become more and more illogical and irrelevant, and his latest letter is, as Dr. John Brown said of a haggis, "a fine lot of confused feeding." To reiterate, as Mr Howard does, that Mr Coates's seven points are sheer humbug, does not prove his case. It is merely an assertion of Mr Howard'-? —and I and thousands more do not care for, or value the authority. He tells Mr Coates he could join up with the United Party in seven minutes. Just in the same way and in the same time Mr Coates could join up with the Labour Party, if he chose to play fast and loose with his political principles. Has Mr Howard not yet come to understand that there are many gentlemen in Parliament, not with his Party, with political consciences? He says that we can both juggle with the Year Book and still get "no forrader"—which may be true. But I would recall to the attention of the reader the fact that Mr Howard was the first to introduce the Year Book, that he cited figures from it, and chose certain years or periods to suit his argument, and that when I supplemented his figures with further figures from the same official volume, he cast it overboard, and invites me to sing with him:

i "O no, we never mention it, Its name is never heard/' I leave the matter to the judgment of the reader, merely remarking that any policy of suggestio falsi and suppressio veri may, as in this cage, bring an inconvenient brood of facts home to roost. Mr Howard assures us that after eleven years in the House ho "cannot detect any fundamental difference," between the Reform and the United Parties. Has it ever occurred to him that bitter political partisanship can and does induce political myopia. There is none ao blind as he who will not see, and very respectfully and not at all offensively, I would suggest to my opponent that he has, perhaps unconsciously, been guilty of glaring egotism when "ha'tells his feTlow-meinbers of the other two Parties (whom he admires so touch) that there is no difference between the policies of the Kcform and the Government Parties, and that they are fools <>r dreamers when they think there is. There is no difference. Mr Howard does not see it, wherefore it is not—quod est demonstrandum, as Euclid puts it. I would suggest that the 50 or so odd members who constitute the United and Reform Parties and who believe there is a difference are more likely to be right than Mr Howard, who is so supremely content with his own "ipse dixit.'' I could go on, but yonr space, Sir, is valuable, and after all eui bono? I do not think the public will be misled. I do think they will believe with mo that one of the main objectives of Socialist policy is to drive the Reformers and the Liberals into one camp. Then the Socialists can go to the people and say "Behold your enemies- They are in one camp banded against you. Now we know where we are." The class war will then have a good start. But while we can see the obvious strategy and perhaps can appreciate its art and skill, we feel that it is something like an insult to our intelligence that the Socialists should think that we cannot seo through their game. We see it all right, and when Mr Howard or any of his Party come forward, as on this occasion, to advise the other Parties, we may well look upon his advice with suspicion. Does Mr Howard remember the old saying? "Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes" —"I fear the Greeks, when they come with gifts."—Yours, etc.,

JOHN STRAIGHT. December Ist, 1930. TO THE ZDITOa OT THE PRESS. Sir, —It was with pleasure that I read "John Straight's'' letter, appearing in Saturday's issue of The Press, in reply to Mr Howard. To my mind tho important part wad his reference to public indebtedness, where v/e learn, and it must be correct, as it is taken from the Official Year Book, that the present Government has increased the indebtedness of the Dominion in one year equal to tho whole of Mr Coates's term of office, and lias also placed a further burden of three pounds per head on the taxpayer's shoulders. These and other harmful acts of the present Government should be given more publicity by the Reform Party, if it wants to make the headway it deserves, and 1 compliment "John Stra'.ght" upon his able letters. I hope wo get more_ of these criticisms ; they are what is wanted at the present time.—Yours, etc., OBSERVER. December Ist, 1930.