Notorious Censorship Regulations

A pall of censorship was thrown over the whole country. The 1939 Publicity and Censorship Regulations were introduced under the framework of the notorious 1932 Public Safety Conservation Act.

The chief censor was J.T. Paul a right-wing Labour journalist/union secretary. One of his assistants was a former editor of the 'Dominion.' All mail was to be opened, read and stamped by the censor.

Wartime censorship can be justified on the grounds that [unclear: utary] secrets mustn't be disclosed and the morale of the armed forces must be maintained. However, censorship in WWII was used as a further means to harass left-wing and anti-war groups and it was responsible for suppressing material for purely political reasons, rather than military or national ones.

The censor worked directly with PM Peter Fraser (who took over when Savage died in office in 1940) in early 1943 Fraser personally banned from the press (including the 'Police Journal') any reference to police discontent over pay.

In November 1943 J.T. Paul forbade publication of 'any statement or resolution containing direct or indirect reference' to the regulations preventing policemen or then wives doing outside work without the approval of the Commissioner of Police. In that same month Paul forbade 'any suggestions that only by striking or threatening to strike can persons or bodies of persons with legitimate grievances gain redress' - he said that such suggestions were prejudicial to public morale.

In December 1943 Paul decreed that information is not to be published relating to any act of any person if such act amounts to counselling or inciting of any person to commit an offence against the emergency regulations.'

This Orwellian order was attacked in an editorial of the Palmerston North Times' with the result that the editor/publisher was prosecuted and convicted in the Magistrate's Court but won on appeal to the Supreme Court.

Fraser complained to the British Government several times about the laxity of its wartime censorship. (The censorship regulations prohibited any reference to the fact that something had been censored, i.e. total secrecy.)