COMMUNISTS IN UNIONS

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28399, 4 October 1957, Page 13

COMMUNISTS IN UNIONS

Reply To Federal Minister ■MELBOURNE, October 3. The president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions. Mr A E. Monk, today replied to an assertion made by the Federal Labour Minister (Mr H. E. Holt> in Parliament that there was a growing Communist influence in the union movement. Mr Monk said that the trade union movement had the right to determine its own internal management in its own way without help from politicians. He said that Mr Holt and his officers in the Labour Department had known just as well as union officials that the trade union congress in 1955 expressed a desire to alter the form of the executive.

This was done by an overwhelming majority, and it was obvious that some members of the Communist Party would try to seek election to the executive through the new system. “Dorothy Dix” questions asked in the House of Representatives were becoming commonplace with Mi Holt—to give him an opportunity of attacking the Labour Party and the trade union movement. he said.

If Mr Holt examined the resolutions carried at last week’s congress. he would find that ail of the executive proposals before the change were adopted in spite of amendments moved by Communist Party followers and groups, Mr Monk added.