POLITICAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIII, Issue 11, 10 May 1912, Page 5

POLITICAL.

HON. G. LAURENS ON 'AT TOKO. Last night- the Hon. G. Laurenson addressed a crowded Toko audience ia the local Town Hall. His address, save for the preliminary, was on the lines speech the previous evening. “r*; W. Were, who presided, briefly introduced the speaker of the evening. Mr. Laurenson, who was greeted with applause, said it was with unfeigned pleasure that he addressed the residents of Toko that evening. He was ,a member of a Ministry that war unique in several ways. It represent ed, as no other Ministry had over done, the small man, the worker, the average man in the Dominion. Tale the Ministers one by one, and thus • would find they were men in entin sympathy with the rest of the people of this country. There was only oik really wealthy man in the Cabinet, ant. that was the Hon. Myers, Minister for Defence, Finance, and Railways—out of the ablest men New Zealand had ever seen. Another fact was that thet were -a purely New Zealand Ministry. There was one Irishman, one Englishman, and two Scotchmen; six wen ■ Colonial born. (Applause.) As for himself, he was not altogether a stranger. He had spent some few days in Taranaki, and had seen the hardship: and dangers with which the backblock; settlers find to contend. He had come in contact with men and women win had spent a very , active part in settling this country. Even in Toko, In was not a stranger, for he had met that evening his old friend Mr. Bain. —(applause)—whom he had known ir. Lyttelton many years ago. He was going to. give them that night a political address. Perhaps he would tread on people’s corns. He could not help that, because they wort bound to hilve different political opinions and ideas. Last night at Stratford he had emphasised the necessity of public men getting bn the platform and meeting their fellow-citizens face to face. “It is essential I should do so,” added Mr. Laurenson, “for J am the trustee on your behalf ol immense interests. I, as your Minister, ought to co.me before yon and give an account of my stewardship. 1 represent yon just as nuioh as I represent 1 the man in Lyttelton. A regulation 1 may pass as Minister of Marine will effect you ; directly or indirectly, the same as it will effect the worker ir. Lyttelton. The present Ministry arc sincerely anxious during their term of office to come into touch with and speak to the people in the backblocks of th?s country. Last night I emphasised this fact, and pointed out the importance of getting on the platform and speaking straight out, instead oi letting people imbibe their politics from a newspaper.” (Applause.) Mr. Laurenson continued that a wealthy man might be a believer in large estates, and he buys up a newspaper and employs a man to write up that theory. , The’ “News,” the “Herald;” oi the “Times,’! might say so-aud-so—he was not referring to any paper in particular. When it said that it was not voicing the opinion of the worker and the laboured. No; it was voicing the opinion of the big and wealthy man behind 1 it. ' They should not believe what Uhat newspaper believes, because it was coloured I, by the ! man who was behind it. 1 1 ' y “Last nighf,” Mr. Laurenson went on to say, “1 referred to the fact that many of our newspapers were established and controlled by the wealthy men in New Zealand. It had since been said'that the inference from my remarks was that I was referring to the newspapers in Taranaki. Well, that was not so. I know nothing of the papers iff Taranaki in this respect. The papers that' I was alluding to werethose published in Hawke’s Bay.” He would say that practically all the newspapers, iff that district were cither established or bought up by the weal the men of the Dominion, and run absolutely 1 in their interests. What was i. newspaper? It was supposed to be ar, instrument to disseminate news. Could anybody say that the newspapers of the Dominion' Were issued onh 'for that purpose? The Conservative Party—the wealthiest men in the Dominion—were buying most of the papers in the country to champion their interests —the interests of the large land owlicrs. Take, for instance, Wellington. Ih that city there was a paper called the “Dominion,” run by the wealthiest men in New Zealand. Ai any rate, sitting on the directorate of that paper were men who owned land, , the unimproved value of which was considerably over’ £1,000,000. ’The public believed that the editorials of a newspaper were the opinions of thah paper, but they were misled. He knew some of our best literary men working on Conservative journals in Nev, Zealand who were at heart the biggest Radicals we had in the Dominion, They did not write according U their own’political principles; they had to' write in accortlance with the dictates of the directorates of their paper, and who were they—the wealthiest people in the Dominion. The remainder of Mr. Laurenson’: address followed almost word for word the address he delivered to his Stratford audience, A slight digression wa.made when, in referring to the need for more Ministers and the consequent overwork on the part of the members of the Cabinet, he referred to the Hon Mr Myers, and from thence to the ays tern of compulsory military training. Defence being one of Mr. Myers’ portfolios. The new system found a warm advocate in Mr. Laurenson, and In spoken especially of what Australia had, done and was doing—how it had sen! its surplus of revenue Home in order to buy guns, how the “Bulletin,” which once scoffed at militarism, wa: now on the side of the Defence Do partment, and last ,but not least, how a Labour Government, with Andrew Fisher, at its head, had laboured foi the scheme. Mr. Laurenson gave it as his opinion that the keenness for an army in Australia lay in the fact that the population in China was 299 to the square mile and in Australia 1.4. He believed that they would live to see a tremendous upheaval when the awakening of the East really came to pass At the conclusion of his address, Mr Milne moved a very hearty vote of thanks to the Hon. George Laurenson. and a vote of confidence in the Ministry of which he was a member This was seconded by Mr. Kelleher. and carried by acclamation. Afterwards a _ light supper _ was thoughtfully provided for the visitors, who numbered among them Mr Joseph McOluggage and Mr. C. D. Sole. The Hon. G. Laurenson, Mrs. Laurenson, and party remained at Toko, staying at the local hotel, and will wait there for. the special train which will take the two Ministers and party to Whangamomona. *