NATIONAL PARTY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 November 1939, Page 5

NATIONAL PARTY

LEADER’S NORTH ISLAND TOUR NEED OF SUPREME WAR EFFORT. AWAKENING TO PROBLEMS. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON. This Day. An extensive tour of the North Island, embracing the districts of Auckland, South Auckland. Waikato. Bay of Plenty, Rotorua and Taupo, the King Country, Manawatu. Wairarapa. and Hawke’s Bay, has been completed by the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Hamilton, who returned to Wellington early yesterday morning. He left i’or the south last night to attend a family wedding in Invercargill, but intends to return to Wellington almost immediately. “1 never saw lite people so alive to political problems as they are today," said Mr Hamilton, when discussing his tom' last evening. "The necessity for New Zealand to make a supreme war effort is recognised everywhere, and this urgent need lias brought with it among the people a very real awareness of the importance of our national problems." Mr Hamilton finished his tour with an address at Carterton on Tuesday night, when a crowd of 500 people gave him an enthusiastic reception. Yesterday he attended a meeting in Wellington of the Dominion Executive of the National Party, after which lie addressed a large meeting of the Wellington Women’s Division. An hour later he addressed a gathering of 250 representatives of the Wellington electorate committees. During the tour lie has just made Mr Hamilton addressed 36 meetings and covered almost 2000 miles. He said that he was satisfied with Ihe response to his appeals for unity in war effort, apart altogether from the intense interest in the political problems that were forced on the country. For the National Party he could say that, in every war work it would play, and was playing in co-operation with others, a leading part. “I was delighted with my tour, which has been an inspiration to myself and my colleagues,” Mr Hamilton added. ’Tn the smaller centres I had wonderful, crowded meetings. It was the same in the cities. From the many visits I paid to centres of national importance al the moment, and from representations I heard from many sections of the community, I have been able to learn much from first-hand experience of the present-day conditions and problems.” At the final gathering before Mr Hamilton went south last night, glowing tributes were paid to his work during recent months and to his devotion to interests of such national im? parlance today. __