APPEAL FOR UNITY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 April 1943, Page 2

APPEAL FOR UNITY

MADE BY LABOUR PARTY PRESIDENT DANGERS OF DISRUPTION. NEED OF CONCENTRATING ON WAR. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. A great responsibility rested with the conference, which would have to decide whether it would face the electors as an organisation with a discontented element, without unity and without purpose, or whether it would forget the little minor issues that did not matter and go forward as a united Labour movement, said Mr J. Roberts, in the course of his presidential address at the 27th annual Conference of the New Zealand Labour Party which opened in the Wellington Trades Hall yesterday. “While we all may have complaints about the actions of the Government about the things that have been done that should not have been done, and the things that should be done that remain undone,' the plain truth is that New Zealand today under a Labour Government, even in a war gives a much higher general living standard to the real wealth producers than they were able to obtain during normal times under a Tory Government,” he declared. “That is a fact that we should not forget, and, though we may have little grievances and complaints, they are as nothing compared with the great work which a Labour Government had done for the people of New Zealand.” Mr Roberts stressed the hope that the conference would conclude with a unanimous declaration for unity. “You will have noticed recently,” he said, “how the enemies of Labour rejoiced even at a suspicion that there was a rift in the Labour Party. You will have noticed no doubt how pleased they were that wreckers were in our midst. They realise as we do that disunity and disruption will wreck our party, but we should remember that we belong to’ a country that has in a large measure solved the problems of economic and social security.. “It must be a great pleasure to us all who have taken part in the shaping of Labour’s destiny in the past to see countries throughout the world copying the New Zealand Labour Government’s social legislation, which is indeed a beacon light to other countries. We can retain that proud position only so long as a Labour Government occupies the Treasury benches.” Mr Roberts said he “was confident that there was within the conference sufficient intelligence to formulate a united policy, that the heart of the movement was sound, and that there would not be any break-away or any wreckers or “ratters.”

Reference, was also made by Mr Roberts to the unprecedented, emergencies that had had to be met by the movement during the past four years, but it had come through with credit. It had not been an easy task for the Labour movement and the Labour Government. The war had not only retarded their progressive political programme, but had compelled them to. deal with problems in a manner which many in the movement might corf* sider was opposed to Labour’s ideals. They had to face the fact, however, that the Fascist, Nazis and dictatorships generally were the most bitter and ruthless opponents of the Organised working class, and they in the Labour movement would, in his opinion, be cowards if they did not sacrifice anything to retain their right to decide their own way of living without interference by any foreign aggressor.”