Impromptu Debates

The four teams entered by the VUC Debating Society in the impromptu debate section of the Wellington Competitions met with conspicuous success. Besides our teams there were six other entries. University A, John McCreary and Joan Taylor, negated the proposition "That it is desirable for allied servicemen to marry girls from recent enemy countries" against University C, Frank O'Flynn and Leonard Samuj. The A team won this debate. University B also won their debate against a WEA team, when they affirmed "That N.Z. should omit Maoris from the Rugby team to go to South Africa." Nigel Taylor and Maurice Berry were our B team. Our D team, Kevin O'Brien and Brennan O'Connor, won their debate when they took the negative against a Hutt team on the proposition "That Communists should be admitted to the N.Z. Labour Party." The judge, Mr. J. Meltzer, commented very favourably on the standard of debating and on many of the individual efforts of our representatives. In the final decision our A team was placed first with the 88 points and our D team second with 86 points. Our C team tied with another team for third place. All's well that ends well and it is a pleasure to be able to record that yet another Varsity club has met with success in its particular field in open competition in Wellington.