TIMARU SEAT

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22512, 21 September 1938, Page 12

TIMARU SEAT

I LABOUR MEMBER OPENS CAMPAIGN "DEMOCRACY OR DICTATORSHIP THE REAL ISSUE" [THE PRESS Special Serviced TIMARU, September 20. "Democracy v. Dictatorship" was the title of an address given by Mr C. L. Carr, Labour candidate for Timaru. when he opened his campaign in the Scottish Hall, Timaru, to-night. The Mayor. Mr W. G. Tweedy, presided over a large attendance. The meeting was a very orderly one, and at the conclusion Mr Carr was accorded a vole of thanks and confidence. "If I can only convince the electors that this is the real issue, as between a vote on the one hand for Labour and on the other for the National Party. I have little doubt how they will act on election day." said Mr Carr. "First, then, let me say definitely that in my honest opinion this is the real, issue: Labour stands for democracy, the National Party stands for dictatorship. A complication lies here, in that probably some of the Nationalists do not know that they stand for dictatorship, so we must not be too hard on them as individuals; but Labour candidates all stand for democracy, and know it. On what, then, do I base my own honest opinion, which I hope to convince you should be you: honest opinion. There are three p'oundf for it. "The Nationalists demonstrated unanswerably their dictatorship of method and principle by extending their own life as the Government, from three years to four, without reference to their political masters, the people. The Labour Government, oh the other hand reverted to the three-year term, not because three years is necessarily long enough for a Government to get fully into its stride, but because the people had not been consulted. "The Nationalists, without any mandate from the people, and, mark you, contrary to ,all their pre-election promises, reduced wages, salaries, pensions, and the general standard of living and purchasing power of the people, thus intensifying to the extenl of pauperisation and abject misery, the effects in God's own country of a world-wide depression. The Labour Government, on the other hand, in accordance with its election Promises restored and increased Pensions, wages salaries, the standard of living and purchasing power of the People.lt also gave a guaranteed price to the dany farmer, whatever the overseas price happened to be, thus overcoming gloiiously the effects of a debasing and degrading slump in the richest country per caput, in the world. In the event. moreover, of another world-wide slump, the Labour Government undertakes to guarantee, not only the dairyfarmer (and, incidentally, as they have done the wheatgrower. without any increase in price to the consumer), but I also the wool man and the producer of fat stock. Thus, as servants of the people and of democracy, and not as dictators, they will, as they have done so far, fully insulate this -sell-reliant ■ and independent country and nation within the British Commonwealth of Nations from world-wide forces which they cannot control: but which they and we can afford largely to ignore.

Money System

"This is because the Nationalists are subject, while the Labour Government is not, to the world-wide dictatorship of centralised banking and financial interests, which engineered the worldwide slump, and through the late Government, intensified its disastrous effects in a country that was, in + the only true sense (that is, in production •of goods and services) richer than it had ever been before. The Reserve Bank, as established by Mr Coates, was but a link of the golden chain enslaving the world, controlled by the city of London- and the Bank of England, and through them by Wall Street, New York Mac Donald, Snowden v .and Thomas went down in England before this world financial juggernaut. The Labour Government in Britain went down before it because of the failure Of those trusted leaders. The poor, the unemployed, the Old Country as a whole, suffered deprivation and loss. New Zealand was reduced to the verge of financial bankruptcy, in spite of its abounding real Wealth; but in New Zealand the Labour Government as Servants of the people, servants of democracy, took control of that Reserve Bank, making it the Servant and. not the master of industry, of our economic, financial, and social destinies. To-day, the guaranteed price, and tne i cost of Government housing, domes from the people's bank, custodian tinder the Government of the Peoples credit. The people's real wealth is to be made more and more available to all If there is one thing that should be under public control, it is the financial medium of exchange., which alone makes it possible for the people to enjoy the reward* of their industry, to enjoy prosperity in exact proportion to their production, and the real wealth they have created. . ; "The Labour Government counts upon your support, in view of promises fulfilled as against nationalist promises broken and forgotten, yet the Nationalists, at the last moment put forward a policy which is almost entirely borrowed from the Labour Government. That applies, anyway, you will agree, to air that is good in it. The Government a national health and. superannuation scheme. They have implemented it within their first term of office, to come into effect with the next financial year. The Nationalists have been, promising some such scheme ever Since the days of the. late-Sir Harry Atkinson. -'They .are in vague terms promising it again ..What confidence can you place in their promise?.now? Democrats keep promises. Dictators break them, and extend their.own life as a further indication of their contempt of the people, hoping that the people will forget and forgive, or at least submit. It is true of dictators everywhere that, if the Constitution stands Tin their way, they ignore it if breaking it can be called ignoring it They ride roughshod over everybody; but their financial masters, the people, are their pawns. They themselves are but puppets. There is no Consideration given even to the little courtesies and points of etiquette generally recognised. A Timaru Subsidy "A little local illustration may suffice, not that it really matters; but straws show the way the wind blows. M- opponent claims to have saved the ratepayers of Timaru £SOOO in connexion with the borough water supply scheme. How did he do that? By going behind the back of his Labour member to the Labour Minister for Labour, and getting an additional subsidy from the Labour Government. "Mr Hamilton, again, will not provide Government houses for the people to rent. They will have to buy them, on time payment, or go N without. tTrider the Labour Government, we can either obtain a loan to build up to 90 per cent, of the security, and make the place our own in 30 years, or rfent a beautiful Government hoUse which, so long as we need it, is equally our own home, and which, if we no longer need it, we can surrender without further obligation to ourselves. Most people who own so-called freehold farms or homes are heavily mortgaged. It is all a question as to whether, in the words of the late Hon. William Rolleston, you prefer to have tte State or the private financier as ■your landlord." ',.:.'.'.. ;j