EDITORIAL RETORT

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 30, 29 October 1937, Page 12

EDITORIAL RETORT

Reply to Labour Minister's Complaint The complaint of the Minister pt Labour, tbe Hon. H. T. Armstrong, in the House of liepresentatives concerning the non-publication of a statement on unemployinent is answered editorially in the Christchurch StarSuu. "Such a statement as that supplied by the Minister is news only to daily newspapers, which number, uot 1-10, as Mr Armstrong said, but 56, and most of the daily papers are too sruall to be able to give space to official statement* published by the city and chief provincial journals," eays the editOrial. "In the particular instance under notice, the fact to be' remarked is not tbat so many journals published the statement, but that so many of them were prepared to overlook wliat appeared to be a piece of pronounced favouritism on the part of the Minister. "Although Mr Armstrong ntated copies were posted direct to 140 newspapers on October 15, 'in sucb a manner as to ensure that they reached a large number simultaneously,5 the trutb is that one Wellington newspaper was given an advantage of 36 hours over all the morning newspapers in the Dominion? and 48 hours' advantage at least over all other evening newspapers. Copies of the statement were dispatched froip Wellington, not on October 15, but on October 16, after it had beeu published in tbe capital city. "If Mr Armstrong had followed tho usual course iu such matters, he would either have namcd a date fov simultaneous i)ublication, or he would havo handed the docuinent to the Press Association, which would have made sure that the newspapers were treated alike," The statement relerred to above arrived at the Herald-Tribune ofiice at a tinie when the stalf was working overtime on the publication of the annual Spring Show number% Pressure upou space oeeasioned by the show, and the Labour Day lioliday, prevented its publication until yesterday. The statement is long and is of dubious news value," tbe average reader probably found it too dull to wado through. The Minister will have to do more tjian issue long statements to conyince the people of New Zealand that the Government is doing anything effective to solve the unemployment problem,.