The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 2, 1930.

Hokitika Guardian, 2 April 1930, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 2, 1930.

PARTIES AND POLITICS J'herk seems to be complaints, in some quarters about political parties, particularly in regard to the divisions. With the advent of politically organised Labour into the arena, there are now tJiree major parties aspiring to rule and direction. As a northern writer remarks, the three-party system in politics is no doubt*very aggravating and it makes the situation so uncertain that anything like definite prophecies about the probable course of events are entirely out of the question. Rut there is no doubt about this, that ti tail'd party, because it is able to cast its vote on either , side and thus holds tne balance of power, has introduced into public life an element of dramatic interest to which the political stage is too often unaccustomed. In this way it has rendered the political situation at any given moment much more exciting and insecure than in the old days of “stable equilibrium” when in the British House of Commons there were only Whigs and Tories, or Liberals and Conservatives to light each other; and what has happened at Home of late is quite sufficiently appropriate to “point the moral and adorn the tale.” Not long ago Mr Lloyd George warned Mr MacDonald that if the Labour Government “went Socialist” the Liberals would join hands with 1 lie Conservatives to vote it out. Evidently Ministers have paid heed to

tnis advice, and they have had rather a difficult task in their attempts to avoid hurting Liberal susceptibilities while keeping a careful eye on the “left wingers” who are still clamouring for “socialism in omr time.” Throughout his term of office Mr MacDonald has been “skating over thin ice,’’ and three times he has come very close to irremediable disaster. On December 29th. last the second reading of the Coal Mines Bill was carried by a majority of eight only, and if all the Liberals had voted with the Conservatives “en bloc,” that division would have seen the end of the second MacDonald Ministry. Again on February 29th. a Liberal amendment to the bill to prevent regulation .of output was lost by only nine votes. Finally on March 12th the Conservatives gor enough help from the Liberals actually to outvote the Government, which was beaten by eight votes oh division. The amendment which led to this defeat was certainly not air essential one, and Mr MacDonald at once told Parliament that he meant to -proceed with the bill regardless of consequences. But clearly the Liberals were rather alarmed at their own temerity, and it became evident that Mr Lloyd George was far from desiring to eject Labour from office so as to let Air Baldwin take Mr MacDonald’s place. It can hardly be denied that, iin principle, there is less fundamental difference between uabour and Liberalism! than between Labour and Conservatism in regard to matters of- publics' policy; and it is always possible for moderate Labourites to join hands with Liberals who are not too theoretical and doctrinaire, to tneir joint advantage. But New Zealand's Liberal-Labour alliance of the Ballance-Seddon era materialised much more simply and naturally than any such pact c-ou-ld possibly develop at Home. However, Mr MacDonald and Mr Lloyd George, in spite of mutual distrust and,painful recollections, have decided that there is more to hold Labour and Liberalism together than i to separate them, and quite providentially the rival leaders have been presented by “the common enemy” with a pretext for co-operation that has served their purpose admirably. The carefully qualified approval which Mr Baldwin .tlir ight it necessary to give to the recent revival of the Tariff Return movement has alarmed all orthodox Free Traders,' and there seems to be no doubt that Labourites and Liberals have now joined hands on the definite understanding that if Tariff Reform is pressed by the Conservatives in l 'any of its numerous species or varieties they will make it “a fight to a finish’' in defence of the sacred traditions of Cobdenism. It is a curious state of things and once again any sort of prediction would be rash in the extreme. But this newly-formed pact has saved the situation so far as Labour is concerned, and it has also gone some distance towards solving the perennial problem of three-party politics at Home. In any case for the moment the Conservatives are reduced to impotence and a Liberal-Labour alliance holds the stage. In New Zealand, we have Labour leaders lecturing the Liberals in power, so that the latter will keep in the straight and narrow way Labour would follow’, hut ever fearful that Reform may return to office, Labour is keeping its political armour bright, and its fighting men in trim. The Liberals pursue the even tenor of their way, and the records of their work so far as blazoned abroad, indicates that important matters are having the consideration and attention they should in the interests or the country as a whole.