A REFORM MANIFESTO WANTED.

Taihape Daily Times, 13 October 1919, Page 4

A REFORM MANIFESTO WANTED.

l It is expected that Mr Massey will ‘ publish the Reform political manifesto, on which the coming election is to be fought, early this week; It seems doubtful whether there is much else to,‘ be made known; the Government has been for sometime promising anything asked for to everybody who asksd, -and it has trimmed its sails to every breath of political wind that has blown since Parliament met. The slogan that put Mr Massey at the head of a. government is still in the fore-front; there is to be “Settlement, and still more settlement.” Having -gone into'power on that slogan several years ago, it is a little surprising fthat there is much more land to settle. Large estates have become much larger, and in much great. er numbers during Mr Massey ’s “more settlement.” reign, and it may be taken as a reliable estimate that if M 1" Massey persists in his “more Settlement” policy in the future as he, has done in the past, in only about 500 years there will be no more land in the country available for settlement»; how about the unborn millions, then? - No wonder Reform Party Organisers are experiencing a difficulty in getting candidiaites for Parliamentary honours to pledge themserves to the official Reform Party without some statement of future policy. It au-gurs well for the country when’ men refuse to blindly pledge themselves to anything. Men have discovered that honesty is the’ best policy; "they have had it demonstrated that the other policy produces a few millionaires, and slowly starves the rest of humanity to death. When an open cheque is asked for by any party, be it Reform, Liberalism, Labour, or even Church Unionists, people beéonie suspicious andsteer clear. The open cheque proposal doesn’t savour of honesty, and people do not like it. This is Mr :\lassey’s experience. and he has found it not only necessary to complete the political document, but to make fully‘ clear on the face thereof what he in~l tends to t'ul-nish. In any case, it_iS“ unreasonable to ask men of honour to * pledge themselves to a policy they‘ know notliingg‘ about. and W." “Tie D 0661 be surmised that _difficult_V is met with! in that connection.