POLITICS AND THE FUTURE.

Shannon News, 25 March 1924, Page 3

POLITICS AND THE FUTURE.

REFORM AND LABOUR. ) : ■ *•

The Auckland Provincial Executive of th© Liberal Labour Party gave Mr. T. M. Wilford an enthusiastic welcome last week (reports the “Star”). Mr. John Trevethick presided.! Discussing thb future prospects of the party, Mr. Wilford said, in course of an impressive address, “All Liberals should be of good heart. The speechesof Mr. Holland's Labour Party throughout the country consist only of abuse of the Liberal Party. If we were not a growing power we should not have so much attention. Labour has ceased to attack Reform, and is concentrating on Beform 's strongest opponent, the party .which stands for. the 'moderate people,of New,Zealand. The Beform Party is bleeding to death, ' ’ added Mr. Wilford. “Its supporters know it, and the members of the party know it. The autocracy of the Prime Minister is killing it'rapidly. The Labour Party is preaching Karl Marxism with the soft pedal on, so as not to alarm the people unduly, but they will never gain the Treasury benches. The Liberal Party considers Karl Marxism as German propaganda, and. it stands for no such German propaganda.” „ Referring to the possibility of an election this year, Mr. Wilford said that anything was possible in the present state of the parties. He belibved however, that any fusion wtih the Reform Party under Mr. Massey would throw supporters of moderate Labour into Mr. Holland's camp, “breeding extremists like jwhite ante, ” as Mr. ’ Wilford tritely put it. He hoped that / the Labour Party would continue devoting its time to attacking the Liberals, r and as leader of the party he was proud to see Mr. Holland and his supporters spending their evenings in this attack on a party which Mr. Holland had characterised as an unburied

corpse. Mr* Massey's “mfercu- /• rial” attitude towards finance, Mr. Wilford said the reason why the Premier was optimistic on his arrival from England and pessimistic when he got to Dunedin, was simply because the Prime Minister did not understand and had never understood, the financial position of the ‘country. At the conctdsion of the address a motion of confidence in Mr. Wilford as leader of the party and confidence in the fact that the Liberals would soon be returned to office, proposed by Mr. B. T. Michaels, seconded by Mr. John Rea, was carried with great _applause. It was generally conceded 'by those present (adds the “Star”) that there had never been such enthusiasm in the Liberal cause since the days of E. J. Seddon.