LABOUR NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 178, 30 July 1938, Page 15

LABOUR NOTES.

UNION ACTIVITIES.

(By INDUSTRIAL TRAMP.)

UNION MEETINGS FOR THE WEEK. Monday, August I.—Shipwrights. Tuesday, August 2. —Seamen, Engineers, Rubberworkers, Metalworkers' Assistants. Wednesday. August 3.—Tramwaymen (a.m. and p.m.), Ferry Employees (a.m. and p.m.). Thursday, August 4.—Brush, Broom and Mop Workers, Printing Trade*.

A TRIBUTE. On Saturday last there wae laid .to rest at Waikaraka Cemetery an old Labour stalwart, Mr. "Pat" Hally, who for many years filled the important office of Conciliation Commissioner for the Northern Industrial District. Appreciative notices of his long career ae commissioner have been published. His funeral was attended by many old Dunedin friends now resident in Auckland, as well as by some of his old Labour colleagues. My own personal acquaintance with Mr. Hally began before he entered on his official career in the Labour Department. I first met him in the opening yeare of the present century. We were delegates to the old Trades and Labour Conferences, he from Dunedin and I from Auckland. He was also a member of the Otago Board of Conciliation, and when the Conciliation Hoards went out of existence by the amending Act of 1908, Mr. Hally was appointed one of the three original Commissioners of Conciliation, the other two being the late Messrs. T. Harle

(Jiles and J. R. Triggs. In his career ae a conciliation commissioner he never

allowed his early training as a trade union official to interfere with his decisions in conducting industrial disputes, but treated both contending parties with strict impartiality. Both sides had implicit confidence in him as a mediator, and during hie term of office, extending over a period of more than 20 years, he acted for the Minister of Labour in settling many strikee and troubles before they had reached the stage of serious industrial upheavals. At the funeral the Department was represented by Messrs. C. P. Smith. W. Slaughter and a former colleague,. Mr. S. Tyson (since retired); the Employers' Association by Mr. E. Anderson (secretary); the Auckland Trades Council by Mr. H. Campbell (secretary); and the Auckland Trades Hall Trust by Messrs. E. J Phelan, C. A. Watts and A. Rosser. Death has closed the earthly career of one of the most tactful officials in industrial matters that it has been my privilege to serve under. Only the" mest fragrant memories of J>at Hally will remain to those of us who are left behind

A NOTABLE VISITOR. Dominion industrialists are looking forward with a good deal of interest to the arrival next month of one of the most striking figures in British trade union circles at the present time, Mr. Ernest Bevin, general secretary of the Kfiglish Transport and General Transport Workers' Union, who is expected to arrive in Auckland by the Aorangi on Monday, August 22, from Vancouver. Mr Bevin and Sir Walter Citrine are the two outstanding British Labour men at the present time. Both have taken a leading part in most of the representations to the British Government for amendments to the present industrial legislation, including the innovation of holidays with pay, which has just< recently been agreed to by a large number of employers. Mr. Bevin's visit to New Zealand has !%>en awaited with interest by a large number of trade unionists, as they know he will have a great many matters to discuss with them which will be of mutual interest to the organised trade union movement of both countries. Hβ left England on July 9, and was to spend a short time in America. Later, while in Australia, he will act as a delegate in Sydney to the conference of the Royal Institute of International Affaire. At the conclusion of the conference he will return and make a brief tour of the Dominion.

A recent brief biographical sketch in an English paper, of this working-class leader, states:—"lt is difficult to do justice to the new Bevin that gradually emerged from wider experience and added responsibility. Vehement as ever, robustious, a natural force which you impede at your peril, his interest has been caught in certain urgent problems of reorganisation, with plans for giving coal and steel and electricity and cotton their proper place in the national economy, for abolishing casual labour at the docks, for revising old age pensions, and increasing the period of school attendance. With some study, too, of financial and monetary matters, assisted here by his membership of the Macmillan Committee, the agitator is changing into the planner and Labour statesman. From reports to hand Mr. Bevin has not been keeping too well of late, and it is on the advice of his medical \ adviser that he is visiting the Antipodes.

DILUTION REJECTED BT BRITISH ENGINEERS' UNION. "No dilution" was the unanimous decision of the English Amalgamated Engineering Union recently in its debate on the 'Government's call for speeding up of armament production.

This Iβ the answer of the union, on behalf of its 350,000 membem, to the proposals foreshadowed by the engineering employers, at their meeting .with this and other unione.

It declared that all forms of dilution —whether by putting eemi-ekilled men on craftmen's work or introducing women to do work now done by men. or any other way—was unnecessary and without justification. Motions which objected to any "co-operation" because of the Government's political policy were sidestepped.

But the conference had already laid it down a year ago that it opposed the Government's arms programme until euch armaments were earmarked solely for national defence and collective security.

"Hi IT