The Dominion. TUESDAY, APRIL 14, 1908. THE PREMIER AND THE STRIKE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 172, 14 April 1908, Page 6

The Dominion. TUESDAY, APRIL 14, 1908. THE PREMIER AND THE STRIKE.

It is not recorded that the, Premier's references to the. Arbitration Act in his Kaitangata speech moved the audi,'euce. to merriment, or'even provoked the interjections for which the speech was peculiarly rich in (Opportunities. Outside Kaitangata, however, the public's sense of humour is'assuredly sufficiently robust to guarantee that the speech Jias aroused amusement'and indignation in about equal degrees. "In the present trouble on the West Coast," said the Premier, "the Government had not interfered since the decision of the Arbitration Court, and did not intend to interfere':"';l'To the resident of some far-distant cbuntry, ignorant of the name of New Zealand,-, the strike, and the. Government's methods of enforcing the Arbitration Act, this' statement of the Premier's will be ac-, cepted as a courageous and - statesman- ' like refutation of tho malicious charge that the Government; had enforced v tlie law, and was (intending to enforce it still■ further against' the unpunished wrongdoers hitherto'overlooked. We 'willingly absolve tlje; Government, of the charge of having enforced the Act; or of ' having done j anything drastic, or ,of having done anything at all.. It ,is impossible, not to admire the Premier's extraordinary method of meeting the charge that the Government has allowed the Act to fall into contempt amidst ; the 'outc-rios- of An_ outraged public. Not less extraordinary was the Premier's declaration that " the Government was prepared to improve the system of arbitration and conciliation, though as.long as the law stood, as it was at,present ..it, must be obeyed, and if either side,. disrespected it,; no one need step in and ask the Government to'help/" The',Government would not do it; because it"would',be a' dishonourable thing to do." These, are sentiments that do Sir Joseph credit. It is gratifying to know that even if the Government will , not do what it should do, , neither will, it do what it should not do. For six weeks past nearly every newspaper in the . Dominion has been .asking the Government, not to help the strikers, but to enforce the law; not to connive at disobedience, but to punish it; hot to act the dishonourable part of compounding a felony, but to act so that the Dominion would feel that " so long as the law stands at present it must be obeyed." The public has asked the Government why it does .not enforce the law. The Premier thinks it an adequate reply to answer that it will not become th 6 accomplice ,of the lawbreaker. Not, only is this strange blend of weakness andTriazen evasion ho reply at all to the charge stiU.standing against the Government: .it is also a direct mis-statement. For.:by failing to put. the law in operation—at whose instance we do not know—the Government actually has connived at a wholesale infringement of the law, and by conducting a long, course of. subterranean negotiations . with the law-breakers, it has interfered " in the worst meaning of tliat word. The Premier's (speech is from every view so extraordinary, and so damaging to his cre'dit as a statesman, that we, are.at a loss to know what he was thinking of. Perhaps he had: in his mind's eye Mr. Dixon, of Drury. It'is true that a strike occurred at. Blackball six weeks ago, that it still continues,, that it has had aiders-and abettors all 6Ver tho Dominion, and that at the-present mbment not one single, offence has been punished.;, But this, perhaps, is a small matter beside the feat of putting Mr. Dixon in gaol.' Mr. Dixon has learned that "as the law stands at present it must be. obeyed," everybody knows that " no one need step in and ask the Government to help" Mr. Dixon, : because "the Government iwould not do it "; and . if the public will kindly turn their eyes from Blackball and fix their attention upon Mr. Dixon, the justice and the accuracy of the Premier's statesmanlike utterance will at once become apparent.;' .... ■ "/The subject," the ■ Premier says, " should not be used by any section of tlie community for political reasons." It ; is admittedly a painful subjcct, and the ■ public would gladly spare the Premier the embarrassment that he must feel at the 1 postponement, through the strikers' obstinacy, of the happy day when he can again declare that the Act is a triumphant success. The reasons actuating the critics of the Government may or may not be political in this matter, llieir criticisms have been undertaken in the public .interest, a&d the Premier's pathetic

appeal can only excite ridicule. He is at any rate deserving of some credit for refraining, from condemnations of liis critics as disloyalists. With his references to the necessity for amending the law we need not deal, for he still leaves us in the dark as to the changes which he foreshadows iri the direction of doing away with "the dead level" of awards. What is more urgently wanted than an amendment and improvement of the law is an amendment of the Government's administration of it. There will be little profit iu amending the law, in any case, if it is to be made a victim of political expediency and reduced to nullity by non-enforcement on the one hand and a quibbling interpretation of its meaning on the other. No Act is worth passing if it is not to be properly and courageously administered, and there is small promise of such administratipn in a Ministry the sum total of whose activity and courage in the past six weeks : was Mr. Millar's summary. dismissal. of Mr. Pritchard.