WELCOME HOME

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 219, 16 August 1937, Page 2

WELCOME HOME

PREMIER AND FINANCE MINISTER. Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, Aug. 15. Auckland’s official welcome to the Prime Minister (Rt. Hon. M. J. Savage) and the Minister of Finance (Hon. W. Nash) on their return from Britain was given at a civic reception in the Town Hall on Saturday night. The hall was elaborately decorated with flowers, greenery, and coloured lights. A most enthusiastic audience filled all the seating accommodation, except in the top gallery, and loudspeakers in the Concert Chamber and outside attracted a number of listeners. The Mayor (Sir Ernest Davis) presided.

The Mayor presented Mr Savage with an address inscribed upon a scroll on behalf of the citizens, congratulating him upon the success of his mission to Britain.

After expressing his heartfelt thanks for the welcome extended to himself and Mr Nash, the Prime Minister went on to speak briefly of his experiences at the Coronation and Imperial Conference. He had come back convinced that there were many men here ■who could compare with any whom he had met abroad, he said. He took off his hat to New Zealand. Mr Nash would agree with him that they were both richer from their experiences in the Old Country, and especially that of meeting men whom they had been writing to and reading about. They had given these men an opportunity of understanding what New Zealand thought.

In a brief reference to party politics, Mr Savage said the Leader of the Opposition (Hon. A. Hamilton) had expressed some fears for the prosperity of New Zealand.

“Our job is to distribute prosperity,” he added. “We haven’t half done the job, but we are well on our way, and wo are going the whole distance. The idea of a man in a high place worrying about New Zealand’s prosperity heats me to a frazzle.” Mr Nash, who had an enthusiastic welcome from the audience, said no one going to another country could have received a greater welcome than that extended to Mr Savage and himself in England. He went there to discuss with our own people ways and means of inducing them to follow the lead that the Government of New Zealand thought would be good for them and good for New Zealand. “I believe,” said Air Nash, “that we have gone some distance along the road.” Mr Nash said that no Government in the recorded history of the British Commonwealth had ever done so much in its first year as the present Neff Zealand Government had done to help forward the life and health and happiness of the people of the country. In the Old Country they wanted to organise the mutton and lamb industry so that the price level would give the farmers in England and Scotland a decent standard of living, and they said that must mean a restriction of imports. The New Zealand representatives said thev would not agree to that, and he had argued the matter at nearly 100 meetings with some measure of success. The result was that last year New Zealand sent Home the largest quantity of mutton and lamb it had ever sent. The striking of the proposed levy on produce, even in its most minute form, would have cost this country £750.000 a year, and lie had successfully fought this as being the most discriminatory against the best little member of the British Commonwealth. Prices were such that no levy would have to he paid this year. “It is unfair, unjust and criminal,’.’ said Mr Nash, “to restrict the production of any commodity that is necessary for human welfare.” He said lie had been greatly assisted in all his negotiations by the very high reputation that New Zealand had in the Old Country because of the splendid spirit shown 'by the men who went to the War and by our players on the field of sport. . . It was now recognised _ that there was no dairv produce coming into England of "better quality than that sen? by the dairy-farmers of New- Zealand, and the Government’s new policy of marketing was most favourably spoken of by tlie authorities at Home. With the continued support of the people the Government would continue to go forward along the road to the goal it had set before it. . The meeting concluded with the singing of the National Anthem and hearty cheers for the Prime Minister and Mr Nash. A large number of invited guests were afterward entertained at supper by the Mayor.