CONFERENCE OF I.L.O.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 70, Issue 259, 19 August 1950, Page 2

CONFERENCE OF 1.L.0.

MR K. McL. BAXTER RETURNS W (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Aug. 18. New Zealand would lose much of che value of the International Labour Organisation if the Government did not pay the expenses of advisers to the conference, said the secretary of the Federation of Labour (Mr K. McL. Baxter) on his return to New Zealand front the conference to-day. He was commenting on the Government’s decision not to pay the expenses of advisers to the conference m future. With the amount of travel involved, no other body could afford to pay for an adviser, said Mr Baxter. His own view was that an adviser for one year should be a delegate at the following conference. The new delegate would thus already be thoroughly familiar with the procedure. New Zealand delegates were sometimes at a disadvantage through lack of knowledge of procedure, particularly when other countries sent the same men year after yeal- to the conference. The conference this time, said Mr Baxter, had been well worth while, particularly to the Asiatic countries. All the delegates, employers, and workers had been pleased with the results. The emphasis had been on increased production, the workers stressing the importance of increased participation in returns. While at the Conference delegates from British Commonwealth trades unions had held informal meetings. Although they were careful not to give any idea of a Commonwealth bloc, said Mr Baxter, they agreed on the co-ordination of activities and the exchange of information, with the British Trades Union Congress acting as a distributing centre. The step would give the recognised trade union movement a means of combating totalitarianism, from whatever direction it came, said Mr Baxter. > Mr W., Fox, secretary of the Federated Cooks’ and Stewards’ Union of New Zealand, who attended the conference, has not yet returned. Mr Baxter said that Mr Fox would be back about the middle of September, as he had gone on to attend the conference of the International Transport Workers’ Federation at Stuttgart.,