FIERCE FIGHTING.

Auckland Star, Volume XLII, Issue 193, 15 August 1911, Page 5

FIERCE FIGHTING.

RIOTS IN LIVERPOOL STRIKERS AND HOOLIGANS. BATTLE WITH POLICE. SCORES OF HEN INJURED. REVOLVER SHOTS FIRED. RESUMPTION DELATED IN LONDON. (By Cable,—Press Association.—Copyright.) (Received 8.50 a.m.) ' LONDON, August 14. A fierce affray arose in Kiverpool during the strike riots, which began o*> Sunday night. Th« trouble reached its height at mid night, when a pitched battle was fought in the north end of the city. The mob extinguished the gas lamps and tore down a wall for missiles. The police were unable to cope with the rioters, the military were utilised. Four revolver shots were fired, and the street was cleared after many had been injured. Four hotels were smashed in, and provision shops were looted. The strike leaders from the first outbreak bravely risked injury from both sides in their efforts to calm the crowd. They blame the police for precipitating the trouble. A number of doctors were for a couple of hours bandaging and stitching the injured in St. George's Hall, which was converted into a temporary hospital, scores being laid out on the tables while their injuries were being treated.

A FIREMAN SCALPED. One fireman was scalped by a brick, and an officer of the Warwickshire Regiment was injured. Thirty thousand dockers in Liverpool are locked out, and in addition 15,000 men are idle in North-eastern Lancashire and Yorkshire railways. Thousands of bales of cotton are lying on the quays and in tho railway goods yard. Several Lancashire mills have closed, and the trade in frozen meat is impeded. RIOTS CONTINUE ON MONDAV. There was no improvement in the loe.ition this morning, and further sharp rioting occurred in Liverpool and Birk;nhead, the position being still very serious. The coal lightermen at Grimsby have struck for 2d au hour increase, and all the trawlers are idle. The General Post Office night telephonists are agitating for better conditions. USE OF THE MILITARY. Mr. Winston Churchill (Home Secretary), in the House of Commons, said that if necessary all the forces at the Government's disposal would be used to secure the free working of London's food supply. There was, he said, no improvement in the serious position at Liverpool. "Although hooligans began the disorder," continued Mr. Churchill, "undoubtedly many strikers joined, and were still participating in attacks on warehouses, factories, and private houses." The police have been assaulted in the performance of their ordinary duties, consequently in the opinion of the Government the police are entitled to effective military aid, and further troops had been ordered in. makinfi the total a brigade of infantry and two regiments of cavalry. He added, in reply to Mr. Ramsay Macdonald, that nothing would be done to weaken the action of the police, and no inquiry into any allegations would be held till complete order was restored.

RAILWAYS RESIST DEMANDS. All the leading railways have decided to resist the strikers' demands, and insist on resumption and appeal to the Conciliation Board.

Mr. Llovd George announced that Mr. Asquith and Mr. Buxton (President of the Board of Trade) were conferring on the whole question of improvement of means available for preventing or- shortening industrial warfare. DISMISSED STRIKERS. There is an epidemic of small industrial strikes in London. There is no general resumption of work in London, owing to the Port Authority dismissing 400 permanent men for staking. The Authority has now promised to consider reinstatement an a condition of general resumption, but declines the request, on behalf of the Surrey commercial docks' porters, to re-open the question of payment for meal time. The situation connected with the railway carmen is critical. Goods drivers and porters m Paddington are idle. The London County Council tramway men will strike on Wednesday unless wages are advanced, with an eight-hour day. The situation at Smithfield is uormai, but the butter business has not been tpsnmed. The wharf labourers are still out. Many women tea packers have struck, and London factory women at meetings in Bermondsey demand improved pay. The Swansea railwaymen are agitating for eight hours, with a minimum of 30/. They have summoned a meeting to consider the date of a strike. nUJKO THE- STRIKERS' PLACES.

The North-Western railwaymen at Coventry protested against the dispatch | of men thence to fill strikers' places at Liverpool. The chairman of the Coventry branch declared that the cause of the whole railway trouble was the Conciliation Board, which the men ought to smash. The tramway service at Glasgow was partially resumed. UMBHOTJBE TO LIME-STREET. The "Pall Mall Gazette" says that the workers generally interpreted Mr. Lloyd George's denunciation of the governing classes in their own ignorant way. From Limebouse to lime-street is an easy transition through several phases of covert encouragement and masterly inactivity in the protection of life and property. The "Westminster Gazette" says that the most serious feature is the tendency of the men of all trades to break away from their official leaders. If the railway difficulty be merely a question of interpreting the arbitrators' award the zemfidjr is eas{, (-i , - - -