A Labour Party Goes Out

From Our Own Correspondent

Rarotonga, Jan. 18.

*"pHE branch of the N.Z. Labour Party * inaugurated here last July, during the visit of Messrs. Robertson and Hun ter, Labour M.P.’s attached to the Parlia mentary Fruit Trade Enquiry, has now ceased to function.

The branch which, together with its affiliated district centres, numbered close upon 1000 members, was on the eve of issuing the first copy of a local news paper when the secretary received radio notification from the National Executive that the branch had been suspended.

Members, amongst whom are several Europeans of considerable standing in

the community, feel this “let down” very keenly, particularly as they have been recently put to relatively heavy expend!ture over the purchase of printing mater membership badges, etc., all of which have at one stroke been rendered useless. . nnnil , QV i , Nee<lle f s t° in as “Labour has slumped in Rarotonga as a result o£ this arbltrary aetl on, where simple suspension of certain branch offlclals P would jn a n probability have sufflcien t to soothe the delicate sus tibilities o( the National Executive, Nevertheless, one’s hat comes on to those whose Machiavellian policies have succeeded in terminating what was, after all, a discordant note in the “bee-loud glades of Innisfree.”