THE POLITICAL FIGHT.

Shannon News, 17 February 1925, Page 3

THE POLITICAL FIGHT.

LABOUR OPENS ITS CAMPAIGN. MR B. ROBERTS'S ADDRESS. Mr B. Rolberts, the New Zealand Labour Party's nominee for the Man. awatu seat, addressed an open-air meeting on Shannon on Saturday evening. Tne speaker got a. good hearing and at the conclusion of. his address was acorded a .hearty vote of thanks. The candidate stated that it was his object to place the aims and aspirations of the Datoour Party clearly toefore the electors of the district. To win the Manawatu seat for Labour would be a great achievement, but only a small part of the work of winning the whole of New Zealand for Labour. It was an ambitious proposal, but the worst was behind, and the future should be bright. Labour was consolidating its forces, and organising its powers towards the end of making New Zealand something other than a speculator's .pjarjaduse and an investor's tairyland. They aimed at giving the country a Government which would (legislate for the benefit of those who did the useful work of the world. The recent growth of the Labour ' movement in New Zealand had been almost phenomenal, growing .from very small beginnings, until they had now 17 members in the House. La'bour was not only a national movement—it was an international movement as. well. All over the world, in India, in Egypt, in Russia, the standard of freedom and self-determination had 'been raised to wage battle against the exploiters who were battening on the productive classes. The time was riipe for a change, and the Labour Party had its part tQ Play in this world wide movement.

Democracy stood foiur (Square on human rights. Latoour had accomplished one great thing; it had made the common things of life the most important topics on the floor of the houses qf legislation. Last century capitalism reached down into the bowels of the earth for coal and iron, and pressed even women and children into the ranks of labour. Capitalism looked to the ends of the earth and planted" the flag to protect its trade over three-quarters of the globe. The Empire was the god of the last century, and the legacy of. the present one, yet with all this, tremendous wealth, potential and actual, the three greatest problems of the Empire at the present'time, the three gaunt spectres that stared the people of the Empire in the lace were Unemployment, Poverty and Debt. "By their fruits, ye shall know them" and toy the fruits of capitalist legislation, those legislators were to be judged. Why was New Zealand the most heavily taxed, and the most heavily indebted country in the world? The people of New Zealand and the land Qf New Zealand had been divorced by speculative activity. Farmers had had to pay far too much for their land, and were staggering along under an impossitole load of debt, with the result .that they were now merely the caretakers of their farms. The first tolush of virgin fertility had gone off the land, apd.it was now poorer than it had been while the price was immeasurably greater. What an irony it was that .the fgreait, muon.vaunted freehold system should have been warped to rob' the farmer of his improvements, yet this was what was happening

when the freehold system was allow-, ed as now, to get mixed up with fie J n " rtg POLICY. . j Every social improvement made m « the community tended to register it- • self in the value of land. It w.an astonishing thing that the land y«u- : nation <tf New Zealand was g eatei than for the Whole of Australia, whioh was over 25 times as large, were 987 land agents in New Zealand at the present time. Labour proposed to alholisH 986 of. thqm, leaving one,, the State. They also d .to ha™ a lair valuation made ol all the lana m New Zealand, which would sent the interest Of the ■Holders in it, and the occupiers would he guaianSed the* value of their improvements, a Siing that did not exist under flue moiteaU teystem. Labour wu(b not. Slfed with the w.elfareoi W> man who farmed the fannei, hut will! Sof the> bonafide> turnwr who .actually worked tie soil it wm onlv by the production 01 tne tZWleobjects oi wealth that could sl£som$ l £som overseas that people could build up the prosperity of the coun K y and discharge the enormous toancial obligations winch f had beea m_ curred. The interests of the woi king firmer, and tiie wage earners of New Zealand were the same, Laibour had no concern" for the squatter or yae bi> C a S, but the imall waking f aimer and the working man should oin hands to combat the forces oi vested Wests which were bleeding the genuine producers.. g FINANCIAL PROGRAMMb Labour advocated the immediate e*> tablishment ot a State Bank with the cnip rieht of note issue to; tihe. ultimate exclusion of private banks. It Zl\ Simple fact that the banks in New Zealand made twice as much nroflt during the first slump year as thev did in 1&9, the height of the & when money ivpplv Bv means of high interest, S Wange rates fie banks were levying a jonsjWfc -W duction of the country. *"* * „ s could never g e.t ahead oC things a innff as the associated banneis ■ »«*" height to raise the interest wte ai Seir Iwn sweel will. New gnd had a population of only a mainon and a quarlier people, and it W* J right tlhat one-half of tne p «*« should'be living on the. otber half, nut this was. what the ship iof land, and private (banking had actually brought about. AFTER EATING ONIONS. All the unpleasant after-effects are dispelled by using Fluenzol as » mouth-wash. A spoonlul (undiluted) fhoiild be retained in the mouth for half-a-minute and worked mund the gums and palate.

lively Bowers are tne smiles oi