N.Z. Party’s electorate endorses Mr Thompson

Press, 29 January 1986, Page 28

N.Z. Party’s electorate endorses Mr Thompson

PA Auckland New Zealand Party members in the Rodney electorate have endorsed Mr Earle Thompson as its candidate in spite of his criticism of the party’s defence policy. The electorate cominittee decided ' to. stick with Mr Thompson after it called him to task for his criticism of the policy and his intention to denounce it at the next General Election.

The party’s North Shore electorate chairman, Mr Barry Houston, said he had offered Mr Thompson a nomination in his electorate as he sympathised with his

defence stand. Many in the Auckland division of the party believed the non-defence, nonaligned stance would give the party little chance on the hustings. The Auckland divisional conference last year passed a remit, which arose from a workshop, saying that it was not happy with the manifesto’s defence policy. This remit did not make it to the national conference list. Mr Houston said it was probably “put aside” because it was too contentious at a conference whose main job was to decide if the party should continue.

He said he could understand Mr Thompson’s frustration that the “other side” of members’ feeling on defence had not received a fair hearing within the party. “If we want to occupy the Treasury benches, we have got to have a defence policy that is acceptable to the majority of New Zealanders,” he said. “The dream of being flower-wavers in this tourist world is unrealistic.” Mr Thompson was the party candidate for Rodney in the previous election and is a founding member and former vice-president.