HON. G. LAURENSON

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 205, 9 May 1912, Page 4

HON. G. LAURENSON

SPEECH AT STRATFORD. D#ENCE OF THE GOVERNMENT. THE OPPOSITION PRESS. (From our own correspondent.) Stratford, Last Night. There was a < ipital attendance tonight at the Town Hall, when the Hon. Geo. Laurenson, Minister of Labor, Customs and Marine, addressed the electors of Stratford. Mr. W. P. Kirk wood, Mayor of Stratford, presided, and prior to the commencement of the address presented to Master John Dodd a Royal Humane Society's certificate for bravery in attempting to save the life of a little girl who luul fallen into the lake at Victoria Park, Stratford. The Minister was heartily cheered on rising to address the meeting. In opening, Mr. Laurenson said that it gave him unfeigned pleasure to address a Taranaki audience. In company with many others he had been surprised when Taranaki, which had prospered more than any other Dominion under the Liberal Government, had gone back 011 it, and returned to Parliament men pledged to turn that Goverumjjjit out, and he had, like many others, boon at a loss to account for the change. I'iit when he had read some of the speeches which Opposition members had made he had ceased to express surprise that a people who had fyeen filled up with that sort of thing, without having had the correct state of affairs placed before them, in reply should have voted against the Government. lie said he had not come to Stratford to slang or attack any individual in the community. Tim present political situation in Now Zealand was much too serious for that kind of foolery. Ho had had a surfeit of it at the last elections, which wero, in his opinion, the most disgraceful ever experienced in the Dominion. Three more elections of the same kind, and New Zealand, politically speaking, would be 011 a level with the lowest American States as far as political life was concerned. The pace for this had been started by a paper founded in tho capital city by the capitalists throughout the country, a paper which, in the language of the personalities—one might almost say brutalities—it indulged in descended to depths which no selfrespecting paper in New Zealand had yet reached. There had been hitter fighting, and strong feeling had boon excited in view of the great changes which had taken place in the last 20 years in I lie country, but it had been Jeft to tiiis paper controlled by the wealthy men of New Zealand, to set the pace in vituperation and misrepresentation. He expressed regret that so many papers were being bought up by the capitalists' class, and that the press was being dominated by them and used to vilify and cripple any man wfoo was opposed to them in politics. The charges against the late Government had been, first, that it had run the country head over heels into debt; second, that it had enormously increased tho national expenditure; third, that it had ceased to he progressive; fourth, that it was corrupt. Underneath all these charges were statements which were used at street corners condemnatory of the action of this country in giving a Dreadnought and the taking of a. hereditary title from the King by the late Prime Minister. These statements had been used with good effect, especially among people who did not think for themselves. Much had also been made of the fact that Sir Joseph Ward was a member of the Roman Catholic Church. He (the speaker) knew that this had been denied by the Conservative Party of this country, but every man in the country knew that the fact that Sir Joseph Ward was a Catholic was urged during the recent elections as a reason why the people should not tolerate him in power as Prime Minister of the Dominion. He made that statement realising what it meant, and ho made it because it was absolutely true that the Prime Minister was hounded, tried and condemned because he followed the faith of his father and mother. (A voice: More power to him.) Speaking for himself, and knowing what sort of a man Sir Joseph Ward was, the religious bigotry against him was one of the cruellest things that ever happened in a political campaign in this country. (Applause.) It was a remarkable fact that while the Opposition had been loudest in its denunciation of the Government's borrowing, its members had been loudest also in their clamoring for borrowed money to be spent in the districts they represented. Only once did a single member of the Opposition moves, a motion in the House against a loan during his time in Parliament, which was now nearly twelve years, and that was a motion moved by the member for Patea (Mr. Pearce) that a loan should be reduced by £200,000. Amongst those who voted against that motion were Mr. Herries, Mr. Hardy (the late Conservative whip), and Mr. Massey (leader of the Conservative Party). For the Opposition members to go about the country as they did, condemning the Government's borrowing, was nothing short of political cant and humbug. Ho declared that every .item in the increased expenditure was justified. The largest item was the increase in railway expenditure, which amounted to some £700,000, but as against this the revenue of that department had increased to nearly £1,200,000. With the exception of a vote for a financial adviser in London—a most proper and necessary vote —the Opposition had never opposed, as far as his memory went, any item on the Estimates as being extravagant. As to the Liberal Party being corrupt, not a single piece of corruption had been proved against the lat# administration. It had been proved that one member of the House—a Maori—had taken commissions for work done for his constituents. and two ex-members, who in private life were commission agents, were found to have taken commissions for work done for their constituents, but these facts were known long before the Hine charges were brought before the House, and the members who had accepted these commissions had lost their seats. Accordingly, the Liberal-Labor Party had been absolutely clean in its transactions, and the real object of the charges, which was to blacken the character of the administration, had fallen to tho ground, and fallen heavily. Referring to the Symes case, the Minister said that Mr. Symes had written to a man suggesting payment for services tendered by him to Parliament. That was not the action of a rogue, but of a very foolish man. He (the Minister) was sure that any man in the audience would rather be in the shoes of the man who wrote that letter than in those of the man to whom it had been written, and who had held the letter until on the eve of an election, and then handed it to Mr. Symes' political opponents to use against him. (Applause.) l The lion, gentleman referred to the proposal of the Prime Minister to increase the number of Ministers, as being one that must appeal to anyone knowing anything of the administration of the country. Mr. Massey had said that the chief part of the work of the Government was done by the permanent officials, and that, therefore, there was no need to increase the numerical strength of the Ministry. Mr. Massey had said, in effect, that the heads of departments are the men to run the country. "I say," said Mr. Laurenson, "that they are not the

men to run the country, and that it should be run Ly the representatives of the people." Ho would say that Mr. Ma»sey s remark that the officials did most '' of the work was the very reason whv the number of Ministers should be increased. The ehigjf part of the work ought to bo "'-'ic by the administrative heads, ami, sp.Miking from his short experience as a Minister, he would say sympathetically that it was utterly impossible, with their present allotment of portfolios, for Ministers to get that grasp of detail which it was necessary they should have of the different departments under their control, and, at the sam« time, to attend to their correspondence and to see to matters connected with their depigments in different parts of the country. Tie considered that the railways needed the undivided attention of one man. With the present clamor of the people for land, the administration of lands demanded the undivided attention of the best man in the country. This was the first time, Mr. Laurenson continued, that ho had left Wellington to speak on politics since he took office. As an illustration of the work of the long hours and the arduous hours Ministers in New Zealand experienced, the present members of the Ministrv were in their offices in Wellington night after night until ten o'clock, and sometimes until midnight, and when they left Wellington they had to take their secretaries and typists with them on the trains and steamers in order to cope with their work. The Conservative members and their press would say, "Well, you ought not to leave Wellington," but he knew that every progressive man would say that the Ministers ought to travel round the Dominion. Their business was to get into touch with the requirements of the people in all parts of the country. He went on fro say that in 18(3, just on forty years ago, the number of Ministers for New Zealand was fixed. At that time Ministors drew, in salary, £l5O mOTe than did the Ministers of to-dav. Since that year the population of the country had multiplied itself four times, the revenue had increased nearly five times, and the departments of State had increased and their operations multiplied almost beyond conception, and to cope with that vast increase the Government had added' one new Minister. the speaker declared that cither the civil service had been grossly overmanned in 1873 or was grossly undermannod to-day. He would say that it was grossly undermanned to-day. In no country in the world did the Government get into the lives of the people as it did in New Zealand. In this country, as in all other countries, we should have' a number of Ministers sufficient to cope with the multifarious details of the •State. Jt was one of the cardinal aims of the Government to help the farmer, the worker, the artisan, and the laborer] and the Government was taking immediate steps to render each class in the country all the assistance it could. The Government would not be found lacking in this policy. They would put before the country a programme of rational reform and progress on sound lines, which would appeal to every sane man and woman in the country. The Government did not expect it would attempt to satisfy either the hide-bound Tory on the one han<l of the social system, or the revolutionary Socialists on the other. The Government believed that its policy • would meet with the approval of the right thinking moderate man and women in New Zealand. As for the charge against the Government that it was nonprogressive, he challenged any man to name any five years in which this Dominion bad made greater progress than in the past five years in ameliorating the conditions of the people. lie forecasted a forward policy in educational matters to make the education of the children such as could fit them better for their after life. The Government would, make the rapid an<l effective settlement of lands a cardinal feature of its policy, and put an end to the day of largo 'estates in the Dominion. He quoted instances of large tracts of land being held by single landholders in one of the bays on Banks Peninsula, part of his electorate. Onethird of the land in the bay was held by one man, whilst the remaining t\Vothirds wero held by 102 ratepayers. In another road board district in the game locality two men owned half the land, and the sons of the people there were being driven to the North Island. It would be the aim of the Government to placo in homes of their own as many people as possible. Concluding, Mr. Laurenson said that the real prosperity of a country was not wholly comprised in its material Wealth. "Our aim," lie said, "as a Government, should be to produce a race of people which will be an honor and glory to the Dominion, and if we perform that we shall perform tTTe highest and noblest function that any Government can perform." The speech concluded amidst loud cheers. Mr. N. J. King moved, and Mr. C. D. Sole seconded: That this meeting thanks the Hon. G. Laurenson for his able and splendid address; that it hopes that the people of this countrv will give him and" his colleagues a fair chance to show their administrative ability; and that this meeting has confidence in the Government of which the Hon. Mr. Laurenson is a member. This was carried amidst acclamation, and .three hearty cheers foi the Minister and the Government were given. The Hon. Mr. Laurenson will spend Thursday in Stratford, and speak at Toko in the evening, going on to Wliangamomona on Friday. The Hon. W. D. S. Mac Donald, Minister of Public Works, will arrive on Thursday evening, and will make an of> ficial inspection of the branch railway and attend the banquet to Mr. J. McCluggage-