AT THE QUEEN'S STATUE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 257, 23 July 1908, Page 8

AT THE QUEEN'S STATUE.

UNEMPLOYED AND SOCIALISTS. HOUSING IN WELLINGTON. At tho Queen's Statue yesterday Socialist orators shook their fists, flung out their arms, and poured forth' vehement abuse on capitalists,'parasite's, thieves, and plundorers before a good-tempered-looking crowd, wh6 smoked their.pipes and placidly enjoyed tho entertainment. One searched in vain for tbo lean 'and: hungry look which Caesar feared ill revolutionaries. Two at least of the speakers looked as if life went smoothly with them, and they had 110 need to "tear a passion to tatters " on their own account. Their hearers looked like men who had enjoyed their dinners, and they said " hear, hear," and replaced thoir pipes, with tho air of men who onjoy good melodrama, but find it more amusing than. exciting. "Comrade" Dowdle denounced the "unsavoury" conditions that existed, and politicians who wished to glut the labour market', to create profit for themselves. Oil Tuesday next a monster meeting of unemployed would be held at. tho Statue, whqnce they would march to* Government House to sumbit resolutions bearing on thoir case. "I am out for tho emancipation of the . wage' slave," said Comrade Dowdle. " The earth is the Lord's, not the landlord's." He denounced the " thieves and plunderers Iving upon their' backs,',' and stated that lie would stand t there till they had forced the Government to 'deal out to the .workers of' New Zealand a measure of justice.THE RIGHT TO STRIKE. Mr. Dowdle stood down, however, in favour of Mr. Hickey, of Blackball fame, who lamented that the pride of many of the unemployed would not let them sigu' their ■names to the lists that had been In Christchurch £200 was being voted for relief works for 700 unemployed; an averago of about os. a man. "Wo're not only looking for work—l've never looked for work — (laughter)—l'm looking for the moans to live, and I suppose that 1 the same thing applies to you. I don't- suppose you're particularly fond of work. You'd bo foolish if you were." (Laughter and "hear, hear.") Ho ventured to say that the Labour Conference would re-ject-Mr. Millar's proposed amendments to tho Arbitration Act by about five to one. They wanted the original Act of Mr. Reeves, with the ■ right to strike if the . decisons of the Board and Court did not satisfy, them. "Tho greatest weapon that you have is to withdraw your labour from the market, and let the capitalists'get on to the best of their ability." When the • workers talked of the prosperity of-New they were sadly blind to the poverty in their, midst. HOUSING PROBLEM. Mri' Hickey, speaking of the housing problem, said' that he had gone over two houses in a suburb of this city, owned by a certain member of Parliament. One was a fiyoroomed house, occupied by a woman with five or sis children, whose ages ranged from two months to six years. There was not sufficient furniture in the whole house to furnish oiie room, and the landlord wrung from that woman 16s. a'weeki The house was. in a most deplorable condition, it had a damp, musty smell, the paper- was falling from the walls, and the sides of the building were rotting. Behind it was a two-roonied cottage, or but, occupied by' a woman of 76 years, who was paying for it 7s. 6d. a week. This was about tho worst typo of pig-pen ho had ever seen; and he had worked on farms. The M.P. who owned these houses talked in Parliament; of tho rights of the people, and tho conditions in which they should live. There wero dozens of' ! similar tenements, some of them perhaps worse. : He suggested that a committco should be formed to investigate these housing conditions, and publicly denounce the owners of. such places. - PANACEA OF SOCIALISM. Mr. James Thorn (President of the Trades and Labour Conference)', urged that the workers were, not being represented in Parliament, as they -would be if. they determined on "a straight-out working-class party working for a straight-out Government of Socialism.," There were .hundreds,;of houses in Wellington where men and women wero living in squalor, degradation, and dirtplaces unfit for human habitation. . - ■ Another reference to the workers provoked the inquiry from, a hostile 'listener"Arid what work do you do." ,"I work with my brains," was the reply. "Perhaps you couldn't do that."

The pana<joa ,of Socialism, which all tho speakers advocated, was' questioned by another interrupter. "Well, I.'don't know any better'systonij" said Mr. Thorn. "All the evils of tho present position can bo /traced to you," cried Mr. R. Hogg to his audience, "and if anybody wants kicking it is you.He had seen the houses described by Mr. Hickey. In the larger house the only furniture'was two chairs, a, table, a crib, and a stretcher, for a man, his wife, and sis children.' The rain came through the roof, and tho chimney of , one house was within hand's' breath of the window. of. the 'other. The' last fact- was ■ a disgrace to tho Corporation of Wellington. When ho looked, at the young baby, brought up lii this placo, he wished that ho could throttle tho .owner-of the house.. Workers must have been created oii ; , the sixth day, when, tho creeping things were-created,; if they could endure such conditions quietly.