WELLINGTON TOPICS

Hokitika Guardian, 20 June 1931, Page 2

WELLINGTON TOPICS

r; REFORM AND FUSION. SOME PRIMITIVE TALK. i; (Special Correspondent). i" WELLINGTON, June 18. a" Til,-© “Dominion” gives pride of jplace in its news columns, this mornto an entertaining address delivered ■ last night by Mr C. A. L. Treadrjv'ejl, one of the., city’s most versatile •'solicitors, to a gathering of members £of l the Wellington Reform Club who iliave a happy knack of associating jjtheir politics . with a generous' measture of social amenity. Mr Treadwell appears to have devoted the part of his address to a wholedenunciation of the Prime MinisHfjr’s “party fusion proposal” which ;he cheerily imprecated as an “astute Apolitical move,” and at the same time and an insult to the inHelligence.” Whose intelligence was S/fonfronted he 1 did not say, but it tprobably would be easy enough to indicate the sufferer. It surely would {have been only fair, in any case, to shave admitted that Mr Forbes made ! hjis suggestion in perfect good faith ■ without any obstructive reservation. ’ THREE YEARS AGO.

.Mr Treadwell as he warmed to his f subject recalled the devolpments of 1928 and of the years that followed. '“lt had become unpopular-for a numi.ber of reasons, the chief of which WQ9 its financial programme,” he said of the Reform Party in its declining days, “That programme hod been shaped as it bad been because Mr Contes had seen the clouds that were now bursting over New Zealand and had tried to shorten sail accordingly, a procedure which did not meet with the approval of the man in the street.” It is quite true that a tight hand was kept upon public expenditure when Mr Downie Stewart toos charge .of the Treasury in the deeliu- , ing years of the Reform Government; but Mr Coates,, to. his credit, would be the last to expect personal applause for the achievements of his gifted colleagues. Mr Treadwell must go further afield for 'an explanation of the debacle of bis party three years ago. THE PARTY GAME. It is all the party game, of course, that so staunch a 'Reformer as Mr Treadwell is should attempt ~io saddle; on to Mr Forbes all- the mistakes of y the ‘ Prime ‘Minister with whom he was associated. He goes back two and a half years to misconstrue the intentions of Sir Joseph Ward in regard to that seventy million loan and lays all the misconstructions of a sick chief on the shoulders of a loyal colleague, who has stepped into his shoes. To suggest at this stage that the United PartyJ|;<nearly three years ago had turned away the Reform Party in order that it might embrace the Labour Party is*, to misinterpret the whole positiofl-as-it-etandsvto-day, - The Labour Party no A w, a» Mr Treadwell knows full well, is simply aching to join forces with the Reform Party ; in ousting the* United Party and this may be a denouncement of the near future, PRIMITIVE ORTTICTBM

>His allusions to the 'sanguine schemes ef Mr Forbes predecessor in office were scarecly worthy of so cultured a gentleman is iMr Treadwell is, a\yay from politics, iand. the ,• suspicion he would cast upon 'Mr Forbes’s bona fldes concerning fusibir. was inexcusable. “One of the most significant things to be about the fusion proposal,’’- he 'told his audience, last 'night|v'^ras : 'that ■it was not made • when the House was sitting, when everyone >was there and the pros' and cons of ■'it could have been discussed. It was not made until the House had risen and {everyone * had gone back to the electorates. That alone is enough to cause suspicion as to the sincerity, of the offer whether it was not merely a political stunt*’’ On the extreme outskirts of political society such a suggestion might excused, or even expected, h’’* addressed to a company of club men it surely was utterly out of place.