LABOUR PARTY AND THE FARMERS

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 33, 2 May 1927, Page 1

LABOUR PARTY AND THE FARMERS

MR. HOLLAND SPEAKS AT TAUMARUNUI (From Our Own Correspondent.) TAUMARUNUI, To-day. Mr. H. E. Holland, M.P., Leader of the Opposition, visited Taumarunui or* Saturday and in the evening gave an address to a large and attentive audience. The Mayor, Mr. G. E. Manson, introduced the speaker. Mr. Holland m the course of his speech, dealt with several topics of local concern, notably the condition and prospects of the small dairy farmer, whose interests, he declared, were identical with those of the workers, and who should therefore support the Labour Party at the polls. The present Government had disappointed all the hopes founded on their advent to power. Aggregation of land had taken place to an alarming extent, as was proved by official figures; wages had gone down and unemployment was iife. Mr. Holland strongly criticised the action of the Prime Minister in connection with Dairy Control, whose attitude 'van based rather on the representation of the merchants of Tooley Street than on those of the board. With regard to timber, Mr. Holland urged that a strong embargo should be placed on imported timber to keep our own mills going and our own men at work. He advocated the formation In England of a food control department, which would control the marketing of New Zealand primary products, particularly through the channels of the great co-operative societies at Home. The functions of this body might be afterwards extended to deal with exports to New Zealand, so that motorcars and manufactured goods of all kinds might be sent here more economically than at present, by cutting out useless intermediaries. This would produce real "Trade within the Empire.” At the close Mr. Holland was accorded a hearty vote of thanks.