LABOUR AND COMMUNISM.

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 88, 15 April 1925, Page 4

LABOUR AND COMMUNISM.

The question of admitting Communists | as a body into the Labour party, which | is before the party's annual conference now sitting, is not likely to be affected in the Communists' favour by the correspondence between the two bodic3. I According to the information on the sub- , | ioct that we publish to-day, the ComI munist party applied for affiliation a- , year ago, and the Labour party's execu- , tive replied by asking for some informa--1 lion about the Communist strength, aims, and attitude towards the larger organisation. It would be very interesting to have answers to some of these questions—to know, for example, what is the total membership of the party, the location of the. branches, and the i names of the organisations outside New , Zealand with which it may be affiliated. , The Communist party, however, though it was prepared io enter the Labour . party, did not answer these qnestions. , This is not, very surprising. The Communist movement at Homo has shown : a similar unwillingness to furnish par- , ticulars about itself. One reason may bo that it does not wish the public to 1 realise how small is its membership. i Another is that, as its aims arc sub- . torsive of existing forms of government and of civilisation itself, it naturally likes to work underground. We presume ! that, apart from other considerations, : the Communists' refusal to furnish t particulars of their organisation will lie sufficient to cause the Labour party's conference to vote down affiliation, . It ' must not be imagined, however, that • this will be the end of the danger of , Communism. Besides working in their special organisation, Communist a try to 1 use trade unions for their own purposes. They have been officially advised from i Moscow, their Mecca, to "white ant" the _ unions. In England the Labour movement in conference has more than once 5 refused to admit Communists, but it is ! \v.ell known that Communists, or men ■ with Communistic sympathies, are , members of unions, and that some of them are influential in the movement*,. 1 Attempts made to secure control of ! certain New Zealand unions have been f exposed. It is quite right that the Labour party should give the Communist the cold shoulder, but this rebuff ! is not going to discourage him greatly.