STRIKE RIOTS IN AUSTRALIA.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 261, 3 November 1928, Page 8

STRIKE RIOTS IN AUSTRALIA.

Though the maritime strike did not last long, and broke down very decisively, it has left an aftermath of bitterness which seems likely to poison the social atmosphere in Australia for some time to come. The shipping companies naturally refuse to consider the dismissal of the "free" workers who saved the situation by taking the place of the strikers, and the unionists are inspired by the traditional hatred of organised workers for "blacklegs." The men who have not yet been reinstated have been responsible for many ferocious outrages arid assaults, generally perpetrated by mobs, upon small numbers of defenceless victims, and the struggle in Melbourne has culminated in a prolonged fight between the strikers and the police, in which the representatives of law and order were eventually forced to fire upon their assailants. It is, of course, deplorable that in a democratic country it should become necessary for the police to use firearms in their own defence and for the protection of the community. But as in all such cases the responsibility lies with those who have made such a course necessary and inevitable. A deputation of unionists has waited upon Mr. Hogan, the Prime Minister of Victoria, to warn him that if the police use their revolvers the workers will be forced to retaliate in self-defence. But this statement of the case entirely ignores the important fact that the unionists were the aggressors. The argument is precisely that commonly employed by burglars or bandits who denounce the police as ruffians and murderers for using whatever means may be required to protect the community against it 3 declared enemies. The Victorian Premier, who is also leader of the Labour Party, was in a very unenviable position. But, to do him justice, he rose to the occasion. He told the unionists frankly that the first duty of the police is to preserve law and order, and left the deputation to draw its own conclusions. But so far as the situation in Melbourne is concerned Mr. Hogan himself has a great deal to answer for. Though he is the official head of Victorian Labour, he admitted publicly a short time since that he had no control over the mass of the workers because the Labour movement in Australia is dominated by the Communists. Mr. Hogan thus endorses the boast of Mr. Jock Garden, and admits the truth of Mr. Brace's accusations. But if a party leader, in Mr. Hogan's position permits his subordinates to defy him and to take orders from outsiders, he has only himself to blame for the collapse of his authority and its consequences.