Second Thoughts Of A Radical

It is probably true that the ordinary New Zealander is as well acquainted with political parties and personages in England as with those in his own country. In his newspaper he reads the pregnant passages of a statesman's speech, the purple patches of a House of Commons debate, the description of a picturesque Imperial gathering, the statement of a problem affecting a score of nations and tens of millions of people. By contrast, the deliberations of the New Zealand House of Representatives, the minute discussion .of the Extermination of Rabbits in the Pohutumaramaroa County Bill, the eternal, stupid dialogue between Mr. Massey and Mr. Wilford, appear dull, flat, and profitless. Of greater moment (he thinks) are the vicissitudes of the All Blacks.

But unfortunately the doings of our Parliament concern every one of us. At the end of almost every debate a Bill is passed, and another law is added to the over-loaded Statute Book. Our legislators believe it their function to legislate steadily. A "good" session is one in which, after weeks of objectless speech-making, the House (with a perfunctory protest) swings into action, gathers momentum as Christmas or the Trentham races approach, and in a final burst passes dozens of Bills. Members leave for home with tempers frayed and impressions confused, but the "results" of the session are there, for the most impertinent elector to see—twenty new Bills. Our legislators have done their duty.

It is a consequence of the superficial examination given to legislative proposals in New Zealand that few of them when passed into law make any obvious change, either for better or worse. They are not laws, but sanctified experiments, and they are treated as such. It must be admitted that in a new country much legislation is necessarily experimental, and perhaps it is inevitable that the most common type of politician should be the "handy man," that statesmen should be few, and their statesmanship tardily recognised. But there must surely come a day when the questions will arise: What is our goal? Have we a goal in view? Is it a goal that we desire to reach?

Consider the three parties in the New Zealand Parliament to day. The Reform Party, consistent only in its protection of the large landowners, violently denounces the Socialism of the Labour Party, and itself embarks on experiment after experiment in State Socialism, in order to retain the favour of the "cockies," on whose votes it depends for its existence. The Liberal Party, bereft of a policy, peddles a trademark. The Labour Party, rigidly doctrin page 39 aire, purposes the transformation of the social body by doses of legislation, aided (as who can doubt who knows of the men who direct the party's "leaders") by the mass strike, by sabotage, even by force of arms. It would exalt the weak, the incompetent, the shift less, and the knavish, for all have a vote. Yet the Labour Party's intensity and unity of purpose, the unquestioning obedience which it demands and secures from its followers, make it certain that it will attain political supremacy, if only when the opposing parties languish or die of ineptitude. Inevitably the question arises: Are the objects of the Labour Party those which the thinking people of the Dominion desire to see achieved?

In New Zealand, as Mr. Pember Reeves pointed out long ago, "the State ownership of land and, above all, of the means of transport, set the colonists' feet on the road they are now treading." We have walked (sometimes we have run) a long way along that road—the road to Collectivism—but not as far as the superficial observer at home, and the majority of observers abroad, concludes. Our system of industrial legislation, which used to be the admiration of social reformers abroad, is certainly spectacular and alluring, but in relation to the whole life and industry of New Zealand, it is not important. Outside its scope are the pastoral, agricultural, and dairying industries, the industries on which, as a politician—it may have been Mr. Massey?—has remarked, the prosperity of God's Own Country depends. How many farmers stop work when they have worked for eight hours? If all of them did, would Mr. Massey be able to boast of the quantity of the Dominion's exports? If our "secondary" industries were in importance not secondary, but primary, could we afford to hamper their activity and stifle their growth by a network of State regulations?

The present material prosperity of the Dominion is due to the intelligence, enterprise, and plain hard work of past and present generations of New Zealanders, aided by the fortunate circumstance of a steady market for the products of the land. Would the prosperity be greater or less if New Zealand had not "set an example to the world" by building a system of social and industrial legislation? If one restrains the tendency to conclude that what is, is for the best, the answer to the question is by no means evident.

The question must be answered. It can be answered only by a patient investigation, undertaken by an organisation of men of broad culture and specialised knowledge. Our University has produced such men. Only a few are to be found in New Zealand, for the majority, most strangely, find scope for their ability in countries which we in our wisdom call old and backward and reactionary. But their knowledge and ability would find an opportunity for service in an organisation which set out deliberately to ascertain (a) what factors have influenced the development of New Zealand, (b) which of these factors are permanent in their influence, and which transient, (c) how much of our legislation has a firm basis in principle, and how much is the outcome of sentimentality, (d) what general principles should guide our legislation in the future.

From such a political stocktaking there might arise appreciation of the need of a political party which would attempt to put the conclusions of the investigators into practice. It would not be Reform, or Liberal, or Labour; it is not impossible that it might adopt the name of Conservative.

E.V.D.