AN UNFAIR ATTACK.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 149, 18 November 1914, Page 2

AN UNFAIR ATTACK.

To the Editor. Sir, —I have been waiting for someone else to refer to Mr. J. B. Hine's characteristically unfair attack on Sir Joseph Wa'ril and his party relative to defence matters. In his Stratford speech he referred to the Opposition criticism of the "tin-pot navy" scheme a couple of years ago, and then cried aloud, "Where is that criticism now 1" It is sunk, sir, in the best interests of the nation, and in a spirit that does credit to the Leader of the Opposition. Were Mr. Hine half the patriot that ho would have us believe, he would play the game, and in this matter would respect the party truce, even though some of the more prominent "Reformers" do not. To the credit of Sir Joseph Ward let me say that he has made 110 political capital, as he might have done, out of the fact that H.M.S. New Zealand, the grandest gift to the Empire right to (late and a gift that showed Sir Joseph's statesmanship, took part in the first naval engagement of note against the Germans. Yet the "Keform" party (spare the name) used the Dreadnought gift as one of its scourges for the back of Sir Joseph Ward in the last general election. I might ask Mr. Hine "where is that criticism now ?" If Mr. Hine wants criticism of the Defence Department, he can get it, and he knows that, too. The Opposition has been singularly silent concerning one or two glaring pieces of wretched administration in connection with the expeditionary force and the troops remaining, and but for the fact that the nation is at war 110 doubt the Hon. James Allen would have one or two posers to answer.—l am, etc., STRATFORD ELECTOR.