The Press. Wednesday, April 6, 1927. Curbing Labour Lawlessness.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18969, 6 April 1927, Page 10

The Press. Wednesday, April 6, 1927. Curbing Labour Lawlessness.

Our cable news thLs morning contains a summary of the British Government's Bill to regulate the activities, or, rather, to restrain the power of mischief, of the trade unions. It is a surprisingly drastic measure, but a perfectly wholesome and necessary one. The announcement in the King's Speech at the opening of the present session that the Government intended to introduce legislation amending the law relating to industrial disputes provoked' the Labour Party to move a hostile resolution, which wii* debated on February 14th. Although Mr Baldwin and the Attorney-General spoke, they declined to give information at that stage concerning the contents of the Bill, and although it was impossible for anyone not to see that the Government held strong views upon picketing and intimidation and also upon the fundamental impropriety of the general strike, the comments of the newspapers showed that nobody could have expected so strong and vigorous a Bill as that which has been introduced. The general strike is attacked directly with the provision that a strike having any object beyond " the furtherance of " a trade dispute" in the industry in which the strikers are engaged is illegal if designed or calculated to coerce the Government or intimidate a substantial portion of the community. Heavy penalties are provided for instigators and participators, and there are stringent provisions against the abominable intimidation which goes on under the name of "peaceful picket"ing." These provisions are no more than is required by the methods which svere employed in May of last year—they are no more than an assertion of the duty of the Government to repress organised lawlessness on the part of trade unions. There is no prohibition jf strikes ordered "in furtherance of 'a trade dispute"; unions are still to possess the liberty to order their members to cease Work as a protest against the actual conditions and wages in iheir industry. But the " sympathetic " strike is forbidden, as it ought to be,ivhen it is undertaken in order to put pressure upon the Government or the 3ommunity. The Bill also attacks lirectly the radically improper freedom if the unions to apply their* funds to the maintenance of the Labour Party. This is, of course, the renewal of an old and bitter dispute. The case against the unions' right to apply their members' contributions to political ends rests upon the right of a ■workman to earn his bread without paying tribute to a political Party which he may abhor, and the case is an unanswerable one. The unions are not to be forbidden to apply moneys to political ends, but they are to be forbidden so to use any member's contributions unless he specifically asks that they shall be so employed. There are further provisions the general effect of which is to keep trade unionism from dominating the employees of the State or of local governing bodies. The Bill as a whole is far more drastic than anyone could have anticipated, and it is certain to lead to a serious conflict between organised Labour and the community. The Labour Party is already saying that the Government is declaring war on trade unionism, and predicting dire defeat for the Government. But the Government' is declaring war not on trade unionism but on labour lawlessness, and the Bill will- bring disaster to the Government only if the Government handles badly the overwhelmingly styong case for the protection of the community against, lawlessness and against revolutionary methods of dealing with social and industrial troubles. The International Economic Conference. It is a fortunate chance that has jnabled New Zealand to be represented it the International Economic Conference by two such' men as Sir George Elliot and Dr. Hight—the one a financier of wide experience and undoubted breadth of vision, and the-, Dther an economist and historian whose work at Canterbury College has brought him a reputation not confined to this country. There has been a tendency in the past to regard trips abroad to represent New Zealand at this or that conference as plums for retiring politicians, who usually cut a poor figure among the best brains of the world, but it has evidently been realised that the benefit to be derived by New Zealand from this conference depends largely on the calibre of her representatives. It is set out in the agenda of the conference that its members are to be appointed for thjeir personal qualifications and are not to be spokesmen of official policy, an indication that the conference, like the Financial Conference at Brussels, will act in a purely advisory character and not attempt to formulate international agreements. Although held under the auspices of the League of Nations, the conference is not confined to nations who are members of the League, but includes the United States, Russia, Turkey, Mexico, Ecuador, and Egypt. The agenda, published yesterday morning, was drawn up last December by a preparatory committee under the chairmanship of M. Theunis, the Belgian Minister for State. Much shortsighted cynicism has been levelled at this side of the work of the League of Nations, mainly because no immediate results are seen, but it is certain that if the League survives long enough its non-political activities will constitute its greatest gift to humanity. The elaborate and rather shaky political

j machinery of the League will never j function properly until it is based on the goodwill, not of Governments, which are transitory, but of peoples, and it is this end towards which the social and economic activities of the League are directed. " The Economic " Conference must be regarded not as " an isolated event," said M. Theunis in a report on the sittings of the preparatory committee, " but as a stage "in the continuous work of inter- " national collaboration in the economic " sphere which had begun before the " project of a general conference was "launched and will continue when the " conference itself is over. The work which we have before uS may seem "to certain people unduly extensive " and even Utopian. It will no doubt "not be our generation which will " gather in the fruits of all our efforts, "but in the lives of peoples a few "years hardly count." Dealing with the objects of the conference, M. Theunis said, " Too many people still " think that the political field and the " economic field are entirely different. " This is a profound and dangerous "error, for every important economic "question is by that fact a political " question. The work of political " peace and disarmament should go "hand in hand with economic peace "and disarmament." Economic peace, of course, is largely a matter of tariffs, and if the coming conference attacks this problem with the spacious idealism shown by 3VI. Theunis, its conclusions will be as unpopular at present as were those contained in the international bankers' manifesto issued some time ago.