PATRIOTIC AID

Taranaki Daily News, 24 September 1940, Page 6

PATRIOTIC AID

DOMINION DECISIONS PROTEST BY TARANAKI "NOT REPRESENTATIVE" Dissatisfaction with the lack of representation of the Taranaki Provincial Patriotic Council upon the national council was expressed at a meeting of the Taranaki council at Stratford yesterday when it was decided to suggest to the Hon. W. E. Parry, Minister of Internal Affairs, that it was desirable the province should have a representative on the national council. Taranaki did not agree, speakers considered, with some actions of the national organisation, including proposals to grant £20,000 for the provision of huts at Waiouru territorial camp and £100,000 for the relief of distress caused by air raids at London. In raising the matter of the provincial non-representation on the national council, the Mayor of Stratford, Mr. P. Thomson, who is vice-president of the provincial council, said he wished to draw attention to some aspects of the national council's operations with which he did not agree. Government Kesponsibility? A proposal had been made, he said, for first £13,000, and then £20,000, to be taken from patriotic funds for the provision of huts at Waiouru camp. He understood the camp was going to be a permanent

mstitution and he considered tneieiore that the money for recreation huts should not con.e from funds raised for patriotic purposes, but. should be paid by the State out of the defence vote. Mr. Thomson drew attentton to the fact that at a recent conference of provincial patriotic council secretaries it was recommended to the national council, with subsequent approval by that body, that £100,000 should be raised by New Zealand patriotic councils for the relief of raid raid distress at London, Taranaki's quota being £1125. « While he would be the first to agree that the rehabilitation of damaged London was a first call upon the Empire, he thought that the burden should be borne not by the patriotic fund organisations but by the nation. The Governments of the British Empire should make contributions to the fund. At a later date he thought an Empire council should be formed to apportion funds to the relief of damaged parts of the Empire. Taranaki Not Consulted. Taranaki had not been consulted in the decisions nor had two or three other provincial councils, who were also without representation on the national council, said Mr. Thomson. "If we are to be asked to raise these funds all the provinces should have a say as to how the money is to be raised and spent," he concluded. Mr. H. G. Dickie, M.P., instanced how, in the Hawera district, he had collected for the provincial fund and, in so doing, had represented to the subscribers that a big proportion of the money was being set aside for the rehabilitation of soldiers. He had also given an assurance that the money was under the direct contrql, in every way, of the Taranaki provincial patriotic council. If the fund .were to be expended in the provision of territorial camp equipment, he considered that good faith was not being kept with those who gave it. Rcpresentations Made.

He had advocated from the beginning that Taranaki be represented on the national council and he had even made representalions in that regard to the Minister of Finance, said Mr. F. L. Frost, M.P., New Plymouth. He supported Mr. Dickie in the main part of his views, and he thought, like Mr. Thomson, that money for the relief of distress at London should be provided by the nation. "These things do show the impbrtance of having a Taranaki representative on the national council," Mr. Frost said, "and I was very disappointed to find that Taranaki was not included in the appointments made recently." The following motion was passed: — "That the Minister of Internal Affairs be urged to arrange for the appointment on the National Patriotic Council of a representative from each province from which at present there are no citizens on such council, and that such representatives be nominated by the patriotic councils of the respective provinces concerned, because the National Patriotic Council will in future be calling on the various provincial councils from time to time for funds and it is only right and proper that these provincial councils should have a voice in the decisions of the national council for expenditure of these funds. "Such a representative will act as a liaison officer between the national council and the provincial council he represents with all the many attendant advantages arising from the existence of such a channel."