THE MANIFESTO OF THE LIBERAL LEADER.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 25 February 1914, Page 2

THE MANIFESTO OF THE LIBERAL LEADER.

Sir Joseph Ward has come to the front with his defence of hi^ adrnistration and his attack on the work of his successors —the " Reform " party. But he has not announced any policy. In this he is quite within his rights, because the Opposition is always the doctor, who never prescribes until he is invited' He has gone so far as to give the country a rough fore-shadow of the policy he is maturing at present in his mind. It embraces the continuation of the Liberal Policy of the' past, the break-up of the large estates, and the suppression of the possibility of Minority Rule. On these points the Liberals have always

professed readiness to go forward, and in none of them has their progress been sufficiently edifying hitherto to justify any claim to a monopoly of virtuous intentions. There is here therefore not much'for the division of parties in clearcut fashion at the general election, due at the end of the current year. The electors will have to wait on these points for further guidance, until the Liberal Leader speaks his mind in fuller detail. It matters little for the moment, for there is a similarity in the expressed intentions of both parties as to land settlement and majority rule, together with the continuance of the big bu Ik of the Liberal policy which has, as Sir Joseph Ward said at Winton, placed this country in the Australasian van. But truth to tell the question at present between the parties seems to be rather one of administration than principle. The " Reform " position is in this respect weak, for the simple reason that in office the " Reformers " have failed to make good according to the standards of their own criticism. In Finance especially are they conspicuously behind in performance both direct and implied. In reduction of loans and of expenditure they are indeed conspicuously out of it. Perhaps it may help to forward the day. when finance is not a question of party any more than the public credit which ought never to be touchod by any tactics at all. But the strongest point of administration after all was the preservation of law and order. The "Reform " government did thenwork under this admirably. Their Opponent declares they ought to have settled the trouble in a day. That is the dividing political line at the moment and the Liberal leader will find it hard to maintain his statement to the satisfaction of the constituencies.