TOM MANN IN GREYMOUTH.

Grey River Argus, Volume 57, Issue 10520, 12 June 1902, Page 2

TOM MANN IN GREYMOUTH.

At the Opera House.

(Continued from yesterday's issue). ' In illustration of his statements Mr Mann quoted the episode of Featherston (Yorkshire) of only two or three years, ago. In this case the mine owners notified half a million of miners that they would reduce the wages and if the men would not accept the reduction they would close down. The men replied that the wages were already below a comfortable standard of living and refused to accept the reduction. The mines were closed down, and to protect their property the police and military were called out at ' the instance of the capitalists and the men were fired upon by the military. In the case of the grea,t ; Dock Strike of 1889, gunboats were seht.to menace the strikers. The law declares the land private property, and although ifc 'was not made by the hand of man, and

its products were essential to human existence a small minority had the legal power to prevent it being used by mankind at large. Truly the system of private land ownership was a peculiar one. The same argument applied to the capitalistic monopoly ot the machines and labour saving appliances of production. The speaker could not claim to have & perfect knowledge of New Zealand, he had only lived six months mthe colony. Our labour legislation was aood so far as it went, but as yet it was far from perfect. He , gave a detailed account of the labour conditions ab the Waihi mine in the Auckland district. Here 1,000 men were employed and the mine was paying very large profits. At a recent sitting of the Arbitration Court an award was made. It has been proved that the majority of the miners were earning only 6s per day. TheC.,urt fixed the minimum wage at Ss bd per diem, and also stipulated thalany man employed by a contractor should receive this minimum wage/ lhe Company had got behind the order of the Court. They discharged 250 of the men, and by another system made each of the remaining miners a separate contractor. Unjler this new system the output was greater and the wages Bven less.

The division of fche joint production of labor .and capital was not an equal one. So far as Britain was concerned, taking the bare dry facts of Sir Robert Giffen fche state. statistician, the annual production of wealth was twelve hundred million sterling. Of this amount four-fifths of the community, this porbionmcluding every mental or manual worker, received one half and the other half six h-iadred millions sterling went to the landlords and nonworking capitalists in the form of rents and interest. This was the reason that poverty existed, and from tha J yearly accretion of wealth thab was ever swelling the coffers of the capitalists, their power was ever growing and they were able to'exploit the world of humanity in new directions. New Zealanders might thiuk that the vast trusts and combinations already formed would not affect the colony, but if so they were laboring under serious error. The capitalist as capitalist was not influenced by any feeling of patriotism, nationality or sentiment. His ruling objective was to increase his wealth, and for that purpose the world was but a field of exploitation. So in- as this Colony "was concerned, if it suited the capitalistic combines, especially the new shipping one, to encourage the Siberian dairy factories, or the Argentine Frozen meat industry, against ihe exports of New Zealand and penalised the Colony by means of high f' eights, where would be the tn trkets for our produce exports ? This Colony was no exception, and with the resfc of the world might afc any time suffer from the baleful influence of organised capital.

Dealing with the necessity of a complete organisation of labour to counteract the ever increasing power of organised capital, Mr Mann gave a lucid and e'ear description of the great London Dock Strike of 1889, a case in which the men, with the aid of the money subscribed in the colony, were enabled to hold out and win for themselves better terms. In this strike 20,000 dockers, 25,000 stevedores' men and sailors, 7,000 bargemen, and 7,000 carriers, a total of 50,000 men were affected. . He stated in detail the solid grievances under which the workers labored and the causes that led to the great strike which arose over the unloading of the "Lady Armstrong" through the dockowners refusing to pay the extra twopence per ton to which the men were entitled. Ultimately 120,000 men came outon strike which resulted in their favor and a shilling per day increase in the wages rate. Eacts and figures used by the speaker, show that every week a thousand vessels enter the Thames, and'month by month the total does not vary. Under present conditions, the management of the dock work by sectional capitalistic interests tended to chaos. The work of the port of London, if under a common supervising interest such as a public elected authority advised by a board of experts could control and work the dock trade with a regular staff with the same regularity as the greafc railway systems of Britain are managed. If such systems replaced the "higgledy piggledy, hotch potch" system which now obtained, the still existing grievances of the dock yard laborers would disappear at once and for ever. The speaker then detailed the birth and growth of labor organisation on the continent, his description being interesting and forceful, relieved at times With quaint flashes of humour. He described his personal experiences and those of Mr Ben Tillet in a manner that raised hearty laughter, making light of the imprisonments undergone, the expulsions from Belgium, France, Germany and Holland, the penalties against them if they returned. He guiltily sfcated , that they did refcuz'n, but unknown to the authorities and carried out the work of labour organisation, until now the International Transport Workers' Association had in most cases doubled the wage rates and in every way improved the conditions of the workers in France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Sweden and Norway. A grand International Conference'will beheld next July, and he advised all unions of workers to send representatives or ab least correspond with the Governing body. Ih animpassioned peroration he dwelt upon what organisation had already done for the workers, and that federation of the workers meant perpetual peace. Granted such federation, Government capitalistic wars could not take place. The trusts and combines', industrial and otherwise, had now assumed such vast 1 proportions that it was the duty of the State in its organised capacity to take them over and work them for the benefit of *hnmanity. The whole community should organise for the betterment of the whole, and the brotherhood of man. Until £his was done the cancer of property would exist and leave a. leave, a lot of labour to be done. In Europe what work in this direction already done was on a solid foundation The new French Parliament contained fifty workers' members, the, German Parliament forty eight, and 750 men pledged to the same programme were now members of the prominent local bodies of Great Britain. During tho delivery -of fche address #Er Mann was frequently applauded

and at its conclusion he received an ovation. His worship the Mayor characterised Mv Mann as the most fluent and besfc informed Speaker that ever appeared on a Greymoutb platform. In. complimentary and well chosen langusge, a vote of thanks was] proposed by Mr J'Davey, seconded by Mr R. Bell and carried amidst great applause. In reply Mr Mann advised the local Unions to systemtise their ideas and not be afraid of oritiscism. Critiscism, he said, cannot kill ypu unless you ought to be killed. He himself had been severely criticised at various times; and pace?, but it did not affect him, he was satisfied thafc he was working for. the right. He proposed a vote of thanks to the Major for presiding, heartily thanking him in choice terms for his readiness iv taking the chair and endorsing the views of a "Labour agitator". The motion was carried by ' acclamation. •