EARLY TRIALS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 169, 18 July 1936, Page 11

EARLY TRIALS.

LABOUR MOVEMENT. "LONG AND UPHILL PULL." MR. JORDAN LOOKS BACK. I ( I The trials and tribulations which beset the labour movement in the early part of its history were lightly referred to ■ by Mr. W. J. Jordan, M.P., at & farewell function at the Labour Club last evening. He was greeted with calls of "Good old Bill" when he rose to speak in the friendly atmosphere of his own supporters. "It seems like a dream," said Mr. ( Jordan, who went on to say that he started with the Labour party in Wellington in 1906, when he was secretary to the Trades and Labour Council. "We battled on." he said, "but it was E long poll and an uphill pull. Tonight in this audience I see Charlie Matthews. He was with me at Ngaruawahia in 1912 when we decided to form a Labour branch there. A policeman came to us and said he "would have us all in before Christmas." (Laughter.) A Voice: We ase still out. (Laughter.) "Yes," said Mr. Jordan, "and we have •been battling along. That was the time when there was trouble up there. "Bill" Parry and "Bob" Semple came up to Ngaruawahia, and we could not get a public man to take the chair when we called a meeting. I was doing some paperlianging up there. When I tried to get some scrim carted from the railway station a man refused to cart it. I said, 'Are you busy ?' He replied, 'No, but I won't cart anything for a Socialist.' (Laughter.) "It wasn't easy going in those continued Mr. Jordan. "One of my friends came to me and said, 'Drop it, Jordan, and you will do all right here.' I replied, 'ily religion and my politics make me what I am, and my trade is only a means to pay expenses. I had to -compete against Tory competitors,

but 3 got the work all right, because the price was lower. (Laughter.) We took it out of our own hides, but we. did all righi." Mr. .J.m'an said that when the history of the Labour movement was written there would be recorded the names of the pioneer men who all took the risks of being "fired in," and who determinedly carried on the work which in the end made victory possible. (Applause.) He said that hundreds of names flashed through his mind—names of men who had fought for Labour—and there could have been no more loyal support than in his own electorate of Manukau. Those men had done the job, and the desire for something better was expressed by the return to political' power in New Zealand of Mr. Savage and the others associated with their leader. Mr. Jordan expressed the hope that when he returned his would be able to shake hands with him and agree that he had not let them down.