A BLOW TO LABOUR.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1371, 23 February 1912, Page 4

A BLOW TO LABOUR.

The opponents of organised Labour will, we have no doubt, note with satisfaction this morning the first important act of one of the little band of Labour members returned at the recent general elections to the House of Representatives. Mr. Payne, the member for Grey Lynn, intimated to the House last evening that, despite the fact that he had been elected under a pledge- to vote to turn the Ward Administration out of office—despite the fact that during his election addresses he had condemned utterly that Administration—he now intended to deliberately dishonour his pledge and vote to keep the Government in office. Wc are not very much concerned with Mr. Payne as Mu. Payne. The. public, no doubt, will feel concerning him very much as Mr. Hahj!is, the member for Waitematfi, felt and expressed himself regarding a member who could act as Mr. Payne has acted. But Mr. Payne, in his capacity as a Labour member, is another matter. He is assumed, broadly speaking, to represent the ideals and the aspirations of Labour. His actions will be regarded by most people as being such as Labour encourages and such as Labour approves. What, then, will the public think of a party, which, it will be generally assumed, has so little regard for its pledges; so little s e6iicern for promises made and upon the strength of which the support of the electors was extended to it, that at the very first opportunity the chance is seized to act in exactly the opposite way to the pledge given ? What reliance can be placed on anything Labour promises to carry out if Labour members break their pledges in the flagrant way the member for Grey Lynn has done? The unworthy action of this member must do immense harm to the cause of Labour. The fact cannot be overlooked that organised Labour is, after all, only a comparatively small proportion of the population. To become an effective political force it must necessarily first win the confidence of the bulk of the public and convince it of its integrity and honour. It may score a temporary success by false pretences— by promising one thing to secure election and acting in a directly opposite manner when elected—but such conduct must speedily wreck it or any other political organisation and make it a by-word and an object of contempt in the eyes of all decent men. Wc do not_ wish to suggest that any substantial section of Labour really approves the action of Mr. Payne. We believe the dishonouring of his pledge by the member for Grey Lynn will be condemned by all right-thinking people in the ranks of Labour, whether or not they disapprove of the Ward Administration. A pledge to one's constituents is a pledge—it is a bond of honour— and what decent man can view the breaking of such a bond without a feeling of resentment and disgust! Those professing friends of Labour, therefore, who have been urging certain members to break their election pledges, are like the member for Grey Lynn, doing more to injure the cause of Labour than nil the criticism heaped on the Labour policy and platform is ever likely to do The more thoughtful section of the Labour party know this well enough. They know that the possibilities for Labour in politics lie in the future rather than in the present, and that that future is largely dependent on the honourable and capable discharge of their Parliamentary obligations by the small band of Labour members just elected to the House of Representatives. They are, for the moment, the hope of Labour—by their actions Labour will be judged by the mass of the people. Only one opinion can exist as to the conduct of the member for Grey Lynn; We do not wish to dwell on the matter—on the influences which have been at work to induce this representative #of Labour to break faith with his constituents and give his support to a party he was elected to vote against. More, no donbi. will be heard on that point in due course. But in the meantime it remains for the Labour colleagues in Parliament of the member for Grey j Lynn to redeem the situation as far as possible by demonstrating their disapproval of the action he has taken.