BAN ON GUILDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 128, 1 June 1936, Page 9

BAN ON GUILDS.

TRADES HALL TRUST. AN APPLICATION REFUSED. The strenuous opposition of the industrial Labour movement towards any efforts that might be made to advance the cause of guilds suspected as being sponsored by employers was indicated this morning when a special meeting of the Trades Hall Trust decided that it could not permit the Market Employees' Guild to hold a meeting in the Trades Hall. It is reported that the latter organisation applied to the caretaker of the Trades. Hall for permission to hold a meeting on Wednesday evening for the purpose of answering questions by any person eligible to join the guild in connection with the proposal to apply for registration of the organisation as an industrial union of workers. After considering the application the trust decided to write to the convener of the meeting as follows: "The question of your engagement of the meeting room at the Trades Hall for Wednesday was placed before the Trades Hall Trust this morning, and it was decided to advise you that the trust regrets that they cannot permit the meeting to be held at the Trades Hall." The chairman of the trust, Mr. G. Davis, stated after the meeting that the industrial Labour movement was opposed to the registration of guilds, and therefore it was deemed advisable to refuse the application in this case as it came from an organisation which was likely to conflict with the interests of the unions. In a letter to the Minister of Labour, the Hon. H. T. Armstrong, last week Mr. Davis complained that the employers connected with the City Markets were endeavouring to compel their employees to become members of a. guild, and suggested that the object of this move was to make agreements with the employees with a view to putting them outside the scope of the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act. It is stated by trades union secretaries that not only does the movement affect members of the Drivers' Union, but also other workers at the markets such as clerks and storemen and packers.