blog #24

Those four important points were well known to the electorate and reiterated at election meetings up and down the country, and we believe the country gave us the mandate for carrying the policy through.

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This is not some fringe concern; it is a mainstream concern. The member for East Coast Bays has made that point again today. The Opposition is now isolated with Dr Sprott. The Opposition and Dr Sprott alone are defending the entry of nuclear weapons into New Zealand. Bob Jones and the New Zealand Party have welcomed the moves the government has made. It was interesting to see a few weeks ago that 15,000 to 20,000 Aucklanders came out to support the government’s policy at 48 hours’ notice. I challenge Dr Sprott to produce at 48 hours’ notice 20,000 cheering New Zealanders to march for the entry of nuclear weapons into Auckland Harbour. I know he could not get them.
I call on the National Party to come in from the cold on this issue and to make New Zealand’s moves towards disarmament bipartisan. It should get rid of that Cold War mentality and be big enough to admit that it has been wrong. The world is full of former prime ministers, generals and brigadiers who say that they were wrong to endorse nuclear weapons when they were in office. Let the Opposition be big enough to admit that it has been wrong in the support it has given to nuclear weaponry.
I notice that already some faint-heartedness is appearing in the stance adopted by members opposite. I have seen reference to a committee—chaired, I believe, by the member for Fendalton—that is examining the reasons for the National Party’s fairly dismal urban vote in the election. It got one seat only in Christchurch, none in Dunedin, none in Hamilton, none in Wellington and a handful in Auckland. The committee believes that the National Party must reopen debate on issues such as its nuclear policy stance if it wants to win back the vital urban seats and regain the Treasury benches. It believes that the party’s rigid stance on issues such as nuclear ships and South African sporting contacts was a major factor in its defeat at the election.
One has only to look at the opinion polls to see that the National Party is out of touch with the electorate. The committee has stated that the National Party is seen as failing to identify with urban voters and their idealistic desire to respond to challenges in the future. What those voters have heard today will do nothing to persuade them to come back.
Let me deal with another allegation made by the member for Tamaki—that somehow the government’s policy might have the effect of creating a whole lot of vassal states of another power in the South Pacific. In 1976 the former Prime Minister of Australia, Mr Fraser, and the former Prime Minister of New Zealand [Mr Muldoon] went running around the South Pacific worried about the possibility that Tonga might become a vassal state of another power. Nothing more ridiculous than that a medieval, feudal kingdom like Tonga should become a vassal state can be imagined. I defy anybody to tell me of any state in the South Pacific that is going to give any succour to any policy of the Soviet Union. That is inconceivable in the South Pacific today.