ELECTORS MEET

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 32, Issue 3290, 19 July 1943, Page 5

ELECTORS MEET

ADDRESS BY MR W. CLARK FORTHCOMING ELECTION REPATRIATION OF SOLDIERS Increased interest in the forthcoming election was demonstrated last week by the large attendance of sup'porters of the National Party at the Masonic Hall, Thames, to hear an address by Mr W. A. Clark, the party’s candidate for the Thames electorate. Mr C'. S. Donovan, chairman of the Thames Committee, presided, and gave Mr Clark a cordial welcome. , Mi* Clark opened his address by expressing his pleasure at meeting his many old friends. He pointed out that the Government had decreed that an election be held this year. Personally, he thought there should-not be an election, and that the Government should have followed the example of Britain and combined all parties in a United National Government, thus obviating the necessity of holding an election during the war. The responsibility for having the election is the responsibility of the Government and not of the National Party, said the speaker. Rehabilitation Perhaps the greatest criticism that could be levelled at the Government was that, after nearly four years of war, with men starting to return from the front, there was no definite rehabilitation scheme. About 16,000' men had already been demobilised, of which only 25 had so far settled on the land. Now, it must be remembered, said Mr Clark, that in order to keep one man on the land, five had to be employed in the city. These men on the land were the backbone of the country, and yet the Government had not got a satisfactory rehabilitation/scheme, because it has. no land policy. The farmers have had a raw deal and they were not getting

justice. The farmers of this country have proved their loyalty to the Empire’s war effort by meeting every demand for increased production, necessitating their wives and families working long hours in the milking sheds without any rise in the price of butterfat since 1939; “and we know,” said the speaker, “how the costs to the farmer have risen in that time.” “I contend,” said Mr Clark, “that the farmer, should be getting the same return for his labour as gather sections of the community. Farmers generally average 68 hours a week, and at union scale of wages this works out at £9 a week. The farmer would, not be getting too much if he got £9 a week 'but how many get that amount? The sheepfarmer also had not had a fair deal, and the’ Government had no justification for not giving them the increased 15 per cent, that the British Government had given the wool producers, of this country.” A Serious Position Mr Clark also dealt with the serious position that the Dominion was ’in with regard to the supply of electricity, and said, the fault was entirely that of the Government’s. In 1936 the Power Boards’ Association told the then Minister of Public Works that in five years there would be a shortage of electricity, but the Minister refused to take heed of. the warning. “In my opinion,” said Mr Clark, “the supply of such an important vital public utility should be under the control of an independent board and not under any Minister or •Department.” An Iniquitous Tax Reading reports of the sj>eeches of ■>he present members of the Government, when the Coates’ Government introduced the- sales tax and how s'rongly each one of them had condemned the measure, Mr C’ark said ( they row believed in the tax, although in their first election pl a’form they

promised to have it removed from the Statute Book. The Coates’ Government started at a 5 per cent. tax. The present Government raised it to 10 per cent., and last year to 20 per cent, in 1935, £1,500,000 was raised; last, year it jumped to £7,000,000. The Party’s Policy After dealing with the great increase in Acts of Parliament by ©rd-ers-in-council, which method the present Government strongly condemned' before they came into power, Mr Clarkexplained many parts of the party’s proposed platform, which, he said, would be announced before the election. Mr Clark assured his listeners' that this country and the whole British Empire will have to face up ; t®> some very grave issues at the end af the war, and the people must be prepared to meet the new conditions. The speaker concluded by thanking his audience for giving him such * patient hearing. Mr Clark was accorded a vote thanks for his interesting address,.,