TRADE AND LABOUR NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 133, 5 June 1919, Page 9

TRADE AND LABOUR NOTES.

<By INtVUSTttTAti TRAMP.) HMO'S MEETINGS FOR THE WEEK. This Ereninpr. June 7 —Farriers. lioilerinsfcers. Stonemasons. Electricians. Satnrday, June 7—BakeTs. Sunday. June S—Railway Workers {Commined. June 9—<JirarworkeTS. Storemen, I'.'.iiiiers. Tuesday. June 10 Engineers, Furniture Trades" Class. Wednesday. June 11—Gas Employees, United Building Trades. THTE ARBITRATION' COUKT. The Court ope:is its winter session in Auckland on Monday next, June 9th, and. as usual, there is an extensive list i of cases to get through. They mostly , consist of applications for an increase of : wages under the War Regulations and j Statutes Amendment Act, or under the ; Arbitration Act, to meet the cost of i living increases. In some awards there i 5 a clause that provides for an application for an increase of the war bonus. Where this provision does not exist, the application is made under the firstnamed Act, passed last session. The business on the opening day largely consists of arranging dates for hearing specified disputes, which may extend over two or three weeks. TRAMWAY OFFICERS' DISPUTE. Since the tramway officers put in their notice on May 27th. of their intention to strike, unless a settlement had been j arrived at in the meantime, very little ' progress has been made towards a ; settlement; the general manager (Mr. Walklate) having intimated his inability to do anything in that direction until he j had received an answer to his cable to Ms London directors, which cable was ! sent on May loth. On Tuesday last the | union officials were informed that a re- ! ply had been received, and a communication would be forwarded to the secretary in due course. Thnt communication was received this (Wednesday) afternoon, and will be considered by the committee before the details can be made public. The dispute has now passed to the Xew Zealand Transport Workers' Advisory Board, and a telegram has been received from Mr. J. Roberts, secretary of the Board, intimating his intention to arrive by train from Wellington on Thursday morning. On his arrival he will assume entire control of the dispute. While I am unable to give detail-? of the increases offered by the company, I may state generally that there is an offer, of roughly, an increase of fire shillings per week to some of the classes provided for in the award of September 25 last. These are specified by name, but that list does not include the salaried officers, shop foremen in the electricians', blacksmiths', truck overhanlers. and paint shops. Neither does the list include the clerks who were completely ignored in the award. The union has definitely informed the general manager that it would not entertain any piecemeal settlement of the dispute, and in order that the company shall not benefit pecuniarily >by the delay since March 21st, the men gave notice also that the question of making any increase decided on be retrospective. Xext Wednesday, the 11th. the poll of ratepayers is to be taken, to decide whether the City Council shall take over the trams on July 1; and if —as it seems likely—the ratepayers consent to the financial proposals necessary to the carrying out of the option secured, only a matter of three weeks' increase of paywill have to be shouldered by tne company. Hence the intention of the men to ask lor a retrospective effect. It is certain that a conference will take place, tinder the guidance of the representative of the Tran-sport Workers' Advisory Board, and the points I have mentioned will have to he ventilated there. The officers have declared that although the salaried officers and the clerks have had their claims ignored by the company, there can be no settlement unless they are recognised in a satisfactory manner. The clerks are the lowest paid in the union, and what has been termed "the bottom dog" must receive fair treatment. In this policy, they will get the sympathy and support of the whole of the Federation. Tn the meantime, the strike notice expires at 4.37 on Tuesday afternoon next, and what will eventuate then will he determined by the treatment meted out to the men by the company at the impending conference, the arransements for which are entirely in the hands of Mr. Roberts on his arrival. A NOTABI/E STRIKE. The Hon. J. T. Paul, in his laboui column in the Otago "Daily Times,' under this heading, writes: — For some reason which I cannot divine at the moment little or no cable news having reference to the seriouf industrial disturbances in America is coming to hand. 1 learn" from Englist exchanges that strikes have been verj numerous, and some of them serioue Certainly we did get an odd reference to the strike at Seattle, but full report. , of the struggle are at variance with th< cables. It was, for so huge an enter prise, one of the most orderly etrikei in history. The strikers took virtua command, and it is to their credit thai they protected the water supply, kepi the electric light stations running, am made available a plentiful supply of mill for invalids and children. The chairmai of the Strikes Committee blames th< •Mayor for the prolongation of thi strike. Had he not been so anxious t< make it appear that revolution ha< broken out in the city the strike woul< have ended several days earlier. Thi cliairman aleo made the following in tcresting statement: — "We were out seven days. Ther "were (30,000 of us on strike, and then wasn't even a fiet fight. Credit for th good order was due to the fact tha Organised Labour knows how to behav itself, and the fact that we had a polic force of our own, which used nothin; but commonsense. "We did something in this etrik Tvhir»h has never been done before by th American Federation of Labour. W pulled off a general strike with craf unions, with ironclad contracts whic had to be broken, and with a Constitv tion wbi:~h had to be ignored. "I believe that out of thifi strike i going to come nne of the best Labou movements the world has ever seei This strike, has shown that the A. i of L. has got to step up a little, and, a for the other fellow (referring to th 1.W.W.). he i= so far ahead he'll have t step back a little. The A. F. of L. \vi have to be reconstructed, and when the do it I believe they'll be glad to hay the assistance of Seattle." THE JULY CONFERENCES. Preparations for the July Labou Conferences will shortly be under \va; and m view o f the national campaigi w hich the Labour party has engaged ii Particular interest will, no doubt, b displayed in the proceedings. The cci tainty, too, of a General Election thi fear will add to the importance of tl "

Cew Zealand Labour party's conference. Sew branches of the Labour party have >een formed all over Xew Zealand, but n many instances it is impossible to 6ay whether the branches have gone beyond ;be point of formation. However, the .vriter has been informed that prac:ieally all the now branches are fiourishii£ concerns, so it is not unlikely that ;ome new blood will participate in t"e inference proceedings. New blood will oe welcomed by many who think it is Dadly needed. One unionist went 6O far < is to state this week that the New ! Zealand Labour party was getting out ot ( touch with the sentiments of the rank ' md file: in what particular direction he ! was not definite. He emphasised that 1 his remark had a general application. ■ 'Apparently Labour is perfectly solid,' ' he said, '"but the fart of the matter is ' that the unity of only a small coterie J alone provides any justification for the| assertion. The average unionist scarcely ! knows the Labour party's platform." The blame for that state of affairs lies: \ as much with the ignorant unionist as ; with the Labour party. The unionist i who knows not, cares less.— (Wellington 'Po.-t' , Labour Xotes).