ARE YOU LOYAL

Hokitika Guardian, 24 September 1918, Page 4

ARE YOU LOYAL

••! THINK I AM,” SAYS MR P. FRASER. “Are you a loyal and true subject to King and country?” was a question put to Mr. Peter Eraser (the Labour Representation Committee’s candidate) at the Alexandra Hall meeting, Wellington on Thursday. The question was greeted with loud booing and laughter, hut Air. Eraser said the questioner had a perfect right to put it. The word “loyal,” lie stated, needed a hit of definition. He had been dealing all night with loyalists who had rooked the people of this country and the Mother Country to the tune of £45.000,000. (Applause and lnuglitor. 1 It’ to do that sort of "tiling was to he a loyalist, then he was not one. (Applause.) If “loyal” meant that they must accept the Massey Government or any other Government till they were voted out, then had to accept it and lie was a loyalist. If it meant did lie advocate a change in society that would effect a great democratic transformation of the country for the good of the people, then ho stood for that, and ho was a loyalist. (Applause.) The questioner complained that- the candidate had “baulked” the question. “1 ask, Mr. Chairman,” lie said, “is ho a loyal subject of King and country in this great 1 rouble we are going through?” Mr. Fraser: “I think I am. (Applause.) And, in addition to being loyal to the people of this country, I am loyal to the workers of the world.” Applause). In reply to another question, the candidate said that he protested against the treatment that conscientious objectors had received, and he was waiting anxiously for the report of Air. Hewitt on the brutal treatment alleged to have been meted out to them at Wanganui. “Why has not that report been published yet?” he asked. “Is it being held hack till after this election?”