LABOUR’S POLICY

Hokitika Guardian, 6 November 1928, Page 8

LABOUR’S POLICY

(Auckland iSiiir). .Mr Holland's speedi at the Town II sill A tick land, must have produced two disuiet. impression* on the .minds of the impartial .section of iiis audience. In the first place, the Leader of the Opposition in expound ini' his policy appeared to ignore very largely the distinctive features of Labour’s oflicial platform which all members of the party are hound to support. Secondly, he seemed equally ohliv.ous of the important fait that some of the positive or constructive proposals that he put forward are LMhtul in origin, and that Labour lias borrowed them without acknowledgement from earlier Liberal programmes. But the great majority >f .Mr Holland's hearers last night were clearly enthusiastic supporters of Labour and they are not likely to he critical of their leader’s inconsistencies.

Regarding the first point that we have raised anyone who takes the trouble to compare the main features ■>i last night’s xiteech with the Labour Party’s oflicial programme must see at once that there is a very substantial inference between them. The party "platform” starting with its timehonoured objective “the Socialisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange,’’ is definitely Socialistic iiol 'in the vaguely philanthropic sense in which an I’.nglish statesman declar'd forty years ago, “we are all Socialists to-day.” but in the narrow and dogmatic sense in which the followers of Karl Marx understand it. There is a vast difference between the two points of view. Air Baldwin’s Government has been charged with “Socialistic” tendencies because it has extended the functions of the State in the interests of the whole community. But the Socialism hitherto professed by the Labour Party here has had as its object the exaltation of the wage-earning masses to a position of absolute economic and political ascendancy and the subordination of every other class anil interest to them.

W’lint the people of Auckland would i.ao to know is, which form of Socialism the New Zealand Labour Party really supports; and they got very little help from Air Holland last night. Tim dist-ini tion is of immense importance to Labour and to the whole nominion. For State Socialism in the general sense familiar to us here is merely Liberalism adapted to the progressive needs of the whole community, while .Marxian Socialism begins with the “class war” and must end in “the dictatorship of the proletariat.” Under which flag has Labour ranged itself? The official platform shows clear signs of its Marxist origin, while Labour’s election manifesto recently circulated and Air. Holland’s speech last night differ from it widely both in the letter and the spirit. AA T e make due allowance for the moderating effect produced on Air. Holland’s views by the wider political experience that he and his friends have gained in recent years. But the discrepancy between the narty’s official platform and the slightly accentuated Liberalism which the Leader of the Opposition presented to his audience last night is too obvious and too startling to be overlooked. Before Mr. Holland can expect the electors of Now Zealand to register their votes in his favour lie must make quite clear to them that the oflicial programme of his party, with its Socialism of the means of production, distribution ami exchange, has “gone where the old moons go,” and that is a feat which lie is hardly in a position to accomplish at the present time.