The Wanganui Herald [PUBLISHED DAILY.] THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1911. "PATTERN SPEECHES."

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXXVI, Issue 13528, 9 November 1911, Page 4

The Wanganui Herald [PUBLISHED DAILY.] THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1911. "PATTERN SPEECHES."

Certain Conservative journals have ol late been complaining that the speoehei of Government arc, all very much alike, that Sir Joseph Ward sets the fashion, and that all his followers make their speeches alter the same “pattern.” Curiously enough all these anti-Govcrn-ment complaints aro on similar, patterns, and, answering their inquiry as to who inspires the Government candidate's speeches, we may reasonably enough retort with the question; Who is the prompter of these Opposition complaints? This alleged discovery Ims already been made by several Conservative papers, and now our local contemporary belatedly stands forth as a discoverer of the same thing. And its complaint is on precisely the same “pattern” as the Conservative complaints which have gone before. Who is inspiring our contemporary' Hut is it, after all, so very strange that the speeches of Government candidates are all on similar lines, or that the addresses of Opposition candidates are all built of similar materials? Let us take, as a parallel instance, the case of a number of students preparing for a certain examination- They are all “swotting” tho same subjects, their text-books are prescribed for them, their courses of study are identical, and they have all to answer the same questions. Does it not necessarily follow that their answers must all be very much alike? Similarly with candidates representing political parties. Their parties work on certain lines, use the same arguments to drive their case along, the members of each confer together for mutual help in attack and defence. It would be strange indeed if there were no similarity between the speeches of tho candidates belonging to any political party.

The Conservatives accuse the Government candidates of following their loader, as if this were something to be strongly condemned. The natural inference would seem to be that the Opposition do not follow their leader, that they are, in fact, a disorganised rabble, each member thereof acting entirely on his own, and each single one having an entirely different speech from any of the others. But what do we find? We find an iron discipline and a loud-cracking whip in the Opposition Party, and we find each single Opposition candidate repealing what has come to be termed “the same old story.” From Mr Massey down to his latest recruit wo find the same, old uniform reiteration of the same old charges, the same old use of the same old methods, and the same old claim that the Opposition’s shadowy platform is a fine definite programme. Let Mr Massey in the north croak of ‘ Tammanyism” and bribery and corruption,” and ’ next day Mr James Allen in the South is repeating the words and talking about “the growth of the public debt.” A day or two after we hear Mr Herdman in Wellington repeating all three, and talking about “capital being discouraged.” In a few days Mr Massey may be depended on to repeat all the charges already made, and to add such items as the “honest Reform Party,” and “purity of administration,' and “increase of taxation,” and "Mokau,” and “loss of confidence in the Government.'' And all the time the Icssc? Opposition lights arc “cocking their ears'* to listen, eagerly adopting each fresh argument their ; leaders contrive, and presenting them in precisely the same way. Their speeches are all on the “same pattern. And a poor pattern it is. For the Government has a policy with some grip and appeal in it, but the Opposition policy appears nothing but a thing of shreds and patches, most of its planks cribbed from the platforms of other parties.