ABOUT POLITICAL PARTIES

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 192, 10 May 1921, Page 6

ABOUT POLITICAL PARTIES

SIR JAMES ALLEN’S RECENT REMARKS

MR- P. FRASER DISCUSSES THE LIBERALS

Mr. P. Fraser, national president of the New Zealand Labour Party, has made the following statement in relation to the article of Sir Janies Allen in the Manchester "Guardian," and tho comments of Mr. Wilford thereon:— "I certainly agree with Mr. Wilford that it is quite unlikely that Sir James Allen stated that there is practically no difference between tho Liberal and Labour parties. I feel positive that there has been a mistake in the cable message, and that what the High Commissioner did convey, or tried to convey, to the readers of the Manchester 'Guardian' was that there was practically no difference between tho Liberal and Reform parties. That statement would be quite in line with some of Sir James Allen's previous utterances. Speaking to a Press representative in Auckland on August 15, 1919, he said: 'The difference between the two' political parties is so small that I cannot understand why they should not become one.' Similar sentiments’ have been expressed by the Hon. D. H. Guthrie, Minister of Lands, the Hon. W. Downie Stewart, Minister of Internal Affairs, and other members of the Reform Party. On October 1, 1919. during the debate on the Financial Statement, Mr. Downie Stewart described the pretended quarrel between the Liberal and Tory parties as a 'sham ffitht.’ Mr. Wilford need not be alarmed. Neither Sir James Allen, nor anybody else, for that matter, is so politically blind ns to associate any of the numerous Liberal parties or groups (it has been said that there are nineteen Liberals in the House of Representative* and twenty-one Liberal parties, including Messrs. G. S. Smith and W. A. Veitch) with tho Labour Party, an association which, while being obviously distasteful to Mr. Wilford, is far more repugnant to Labour. It is noteworthy, however, that Sir James Allen, reading the. political signs of the times correctly, apparently locks upon the early extinction of the Liberal Party as inevitable. .and accordingly he sheds a brotherly tear over its unavoidable doom. He now regrets that the sham fight between the Tory Tweedledee and the Liberal Tweedledum cannot, be prolonged, and some of the people Ire fooled all the time. Sir James Allen falls into an error when he includes three Independent members of Parliament among the-Labour members. There is absolutely unity and cohesion in the Parliamentary Labour Party.

"It is surolv regrettable that the leader of the Wilford Liberal Party, as distinct from the M'Callum Liberal Party, the Witty Liberal Party, the Atmore Liberal Party, the . Dr. Thacker Liberal Party, the Vigor Brown Liberal Party, or any of the other odd twenty or so Liberal parties, should, contrary to the expressed wish of His Majestj King George that the Royal Family and the National Anthem should be.kept out of party politics, have used the King’s name for party purposes. The use of tho words ‘loyalty,’ 'Empire,' 'patriotism.' and so on, by the average capitalist politician easily descends into claptrap, even if they are useful as a smoke screen for political' incompetency and bankruptcy of party principles and ideals. The Labour Party most certainly does not support everything done in the name of the Empire, a term , which the lute Admiral Lord Fisher denounced as a 'Hun word.’ For instance, it whole-heartedly condemns the policy of the Lloyd George Government in Ireland, which, judging by their votes in the House of Representatives, Mr. Wilford and his followers ns whole-heartedly support. Does Mr. Wilford consider the love of country displayed by the Irish people to be of that, genuine kind which he respects and honours? "The leader of tho Wilford Liberals further states that- the Liberals abhor Royietism and Communism. I have never yet heard or seen a single word from a Liberal member of Parliament which bv any possibility could indicate that anv one of their different brands understood what these terms denote. Perhaps Mr. Wilford might let us see that he understands what he and his followers profess to abhor before he tells ns they abhor it. As for the Rod Flag nnd the Labour Party’s objective, ‘The socialisation, of the means of production,' distribution, and exchange,’ considering that men of outstanding intellectual power like William Morris, Professor •Alfred Russell Wallace, George Bernard Shaw. Anatole France, Henri Barbusse, George Brandes, Jean Jaures, H. G. Wells. Sir Svdnev Olivier, Emile Vanderveldt. Karl Liebknecht, and thousands of other lending scientists, authors, poets, painters, and leaders of social, political, and economic thought, have stood for that flag and that objective, and all that they spell, as the only hope for humanity, the Socialist movement will tnke th" opposition of Mr. T. M. Wilford. M.P. for Hutt, and leader of a party of a dozen, more or less, in the House, of Representatives, who admittedly stands for the Black Flag of Capitalism nnd nil the ruin and disaster it spoils, with the greatest equanimity and amusement.”