LABOUR AIMS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 29 January 1940, Page 6

LABOUR AIMS

DETERMINATION TO WIN PEACE HUMAN PROGRESS SCUTTLED BY NAZIS. SUPPORT FOR WAR EFFORT. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY. January 27. In connection with the meetings addressed in Britain today the Opposition. which declined to cooperate in the Government campaign, brought, the support of the Labour movement to the national effort in several well-attended meetings of its own. The Labour leader. Mr Attlee, speaking at Cardiff, linked Labour's attitude to the present war to workers in industry who. having exhausted every peaceful means, find themselves obliged to call a strike, well knowing the loss and suffering which must follow, but having no alternative save abject submission. Such a strike, he said, would continue so long as there was a principle nt stake.

"Hitler has committed violent aggression against Czechoslovakia and Poland.” Mr Attlee continued. "His policy is one of extort mg by force or a threat of force whatever he wishes to get. He shows no signs whatever in any way of changing his attitude. If he wants peace he can got it. but in view of his record he must show by deeds and not merely words that he means business.

"He must make restitution to those he attacked and show he has abandoned the course of action that has put all the people of Europe under a menace.”

Speaking at a conference on Labour’s peace aims today. Mrs Ayrton Gould, prominent executive member of the Labour Party, brought a message from a soldier who fought in the last war and is about to go out again to France. "Tell them.” he said, "we will win the war again, but this time we must win the peace.”

There could be neither freedom, hope nor decency while Nazism existed, Mrs Gould said. "Hitler has scuttled much more than the Admiral Graf Spec. He has scuttled human progress. Jungle law is spreading in Europe. That must be stopped first, but when that is done we must build a future founded on trust and equity for all peoples. Labour’s peace aims mean security."

"There has been no real peace since Hitler became firmly planted in the German saddle." said another of the party’s leaders. Mr Herbert Morrison. -International relationships became unbearable, and as Hitler would not mend his ways Britain and France had to stand up' to him. .

"Hating and deploring war though I do. I think there is no real alternative but to go through with it. We can't blow hot and cold when we are dealing with Hitlerism. I would respectfully beg of Hie neutral nations—big and small—to recognise the facts of this dangerous world. “They can retort that Britain for years was hesitant and without a real moral purpose in her foreign affairs. It, is a fair point, and I do not dispute it.” But the fact remained, he continued, that a combination of the peaceful nations was necessary io procure and maintain the order, security and well-being of all. If such a policy wore sound at the end of a war its application was no. less sound during the hostilities.

Britain and France, he believed, would win. but the victory would come all the sooner if they had the goodwill and all practicable support from other countries.

He urged that help should be given to Finland to “achieve a victory against the vast and powerful aggression. The Finns are a brave, amazing people." he commented. “They have earned the admiration of all free peoples.”