LABOUR RALLY.

Shannon News, 20 November 1923, Page 3

LABOUR RALLY.

MR ERASER, M.P., ADDRESSES, MEETING. " :

At the Maoriland Theatre On Sundiay evening/ under the auspices of the Shannon Labour Party, Mr P. Fraser, MvP., for Wellington. Central, delivered an able address on thiei aims ol the Labour Party and. what the Party stood for, Mr R. Down.es occu-, pied .the chair. He dealt ait length' with the policy land platform of the Liberals and Reform during which hie stated that to-day they were practically the same in regard to their attitude, towards the worker. The Massey Govierninaints he .. ■ isiaid', : .werie in; power on a minority .vote arid during their term of office they had never been .elected by a majority'vote, therefore they were, not representative of the people. He pointed out that thte worker could never look to them for assistance as their interests were directly opposed. There was a fact the worker should grasp that during,the war wages never caugjht up to the cost of living 'and he quoted the following; figures to show that in 1914 the average wage was £3 2s 6d, the purchasing vaime being £2 1.6 s 7d as against 1921, when the wage was £4 19s, with ai purchasing value of £2 16s, these figures 'being for the three groups which are taken by the 'Gourt t .viz., food, lienlfc and! fuel. In sp/itfei of this fact, hie said, when tthex' .Massey' Government s-awj the first signs, of depression, they; backed by the; Press, started to call' for economy and 'aided by the Liberals immediately turned their ©yes not to war profits but to the workers' wages and decreed that they should, come down:, instead of bringing down rent and interest. , This was done becausei the Government in power was not there in the interests of . the workers, but for the, henefit of financiers, exploiters and:the like. He said he did mot think there was any worker who expected anything from the Massey Government... In Nlew Zealand th% wages had nlever been sufficient to* do justice to a family. He strongly; criticised the Reform party on the taxation question,, stating they had reduced taxation on wealthy people at the expense- of the worker, ( having given li 'million to their wealthy friends at a cost of onfe million by reduction of wages on the. first cult to the worker. This was a scandal. He; said so long as the Liberals were in thte House, Labour would never defeat the Massey Government on any .'measures that came before them which would benefit the workers. Once .the Liberals' were the real thing'in New that was in 1885 when Sir George .Grey's policy was the same as that of Labour to-' day on'the land question. HJ© warn- j ed* them__ of the land monopoly in Britain, which, had brought about unemployment, housing problem and slum.'areas, and he advocated that the Government, should handle the land and that it; be used for all the people. The speaker advocated a State Bank which would be' in the interests of the farmers and commerce generally. Alter dealing with proportional representation and other questions of importance to the worker he made -. iM'ong appeal to those present and h'Hjt'd thoy would give-, the question, their deepest thought and think the position out for -themselves. ' The .nesting concluded with a vote of thanks to the spteaker for his address. This was carried by acclamation.