The Daily News. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1922. THE POLITICAL OUTLOOK.

Taranaki Daily News, 14 October 1922, Page 4

The Daily News. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1922. THE POLITICAL OUTLOOK.

There is some similarity in the political situation in the Mother Country to that which exists in New Zealand, so that two articles which were recently contributed to the London Daily Telegraph on “The Common Sense of Politics” contain matter that should be of interest to the electors of the Dominion, who will shortly be called upon to exercise their franchise. It is an appropriate time to take stock of the political situation when people have the leisure to review the position as a whole without reference to any particular leader or party, and without bias either one way or the other. In Britain the Coalition still survives the many attempts made at disruption, but the effort that was initiated some eighteen months ago to create in the constituencies an atmosphere favorable to the fusion of the two wings of the Coalition into one united party, with a single party organisation, has not borne fruit. On the contrary, there is at the present time an agitation in operation to break up the Coalition and terminate Mr. Lloyd George’s Premiership. The outstanding reason for unification was that the Labor Party was the common enemy of both Unionists and Liberals alike, while its avowed principles were as subversive of Unionism as of Liberalism. This feature of the political situation is common to both Britain and New Zealand, because Labor insists on fighting its own hand alone, and, theoretically at least, is equally opposed to Unionists and Liberals. As each week brings nearer the general elections, when the question will have to be faced as to ■ whether Labor can contra) by its votes the votes of the other two parties, it would seem advisable to take Time by the forelock. Assuming the possibility of Labor in New Zealand refraining from splitting votes where there is no chance of securing a majority, and by that means reducing the present Government’s majority to a point where Labor will hold the balance of power, what, will Keypen? No party would be strong j enough to form a Government, except by forming a temporary Coalition o£ some kind. In Such

a problem, it is necessary to note the trend of the voting at the last election, and the moral to be deduced therefrom. If the people of.the Dominion are guided by the common-sense of polities, they cannot but admit that the policy of the Reform Party is not reactionary, or that true Liberalism is not revolutionary. The difference between the two parties, from the viewpoint of impartial observers, appears to consist in the application of principles rather than in the principles themselves. At no time in modern political history have the two main parties been so little divided by principle. Possibly the Reform Party may be the first to admit that they have become Liberals, because they recognised that only true Liberal principles can meet the political needs of the Dominion. Political opinion in the general way is not of much value, because it is so often a cast-iron product, the form and quality of which can J only be altered by a hammer and ' a melting pot. The cast-iron of prejudice is too often confused with the steel of principle, and where the structure of any political or other faith is dependent on the former, disaster in times of stress in inevitable. If the extreme Labor Party—which is fev erishly striving to increase its efficiency_is to be checkmated, then there must be a solid, sane and progressive National party. Labor’s strength lies in the fact that it is an industrial organisation politically applied; its programme more personal than political. Only a Government backed by a united National Party composed of the best skill, wisdom, firmness and broad sympathy obtainable, can be expected to rightly solve the problems that will have to be faced in the next decade. The Labor way was enunciated by Mr. Holland on Thursday. It is to reduce the national debt by a wholesale levy on capital “accumulated between 1914 and 1921.” It has not occurred to Mr. Holland that much of this “wealth” has been taken by the Governnient in taxes and compulse ry loans, and the rest has disappeared during the recent slump.