THROTTLING INDUSTRIAL ENTERPRISE.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1098, 10 April 1911, Page 4

THROTTLING INDUSTRIAL ENTERPRISE.

A remark credited to Mr. W. T. Young, a Labour candidate for a seat on the Harbour Board, is worth a little attention because it touches the fringe of a very largo and important question. Mr. Young, in deploring the scanty attendance at a public meeting convened by the

Labour party for Friday evening last, is reported to have said : "t spoke to empty benches on Monday night, and I am almost sneaking to them to-night. 'Wo find the General Labourers' Union confronted with a serious difficulty, and the tramway employees are in the same position. If they are to get out of that and obtain justice it is necessary that they should send to thq council persons directly representing themselves, and before th?y can do that it is necessary that they should take an interest in municipal affairs." This appeal, if it means anything at all, means that the Labour candidates wish to create the idea that justice can only bc assured to the employees of local bodies by electing as members thereof the official representatives of the trades unions. Pursuing that line of reasoning Mk. Young would hive the public believe that the City Council and the Harbour Board are composed of men who, for some unexplained reason, are so blinded to all that is right and just that they are ready to do active injustice to public employees. Mr. Young added that "if Labour were in power the people would get a cheaper tram service and the men would have better conditions." To this latter remark a man in the audience is reported to have made the pertinent interjection: "And who would pay!" Who, indeed. Of course Mr. Young was electioneering and we suppose some latitude must be allowed to candidates bidding for votes. But we doubt if any greater injury has been done to the industrial development of this country than that caused by the feeling created by this style of electioneering. Its constant use for years past by politicians anxious to build up a solid Labour vote to serve their own political ends has been responsible for the creation of a habit of thought —or rather a prevalent idea— amongst a large section of people, that the employers and employees are natural enemies. Instead of it being universally recognised that each being dependent on the other it is to their mutual interest to

work in. harmony, , and with as little friction as possible, the idea is fomented that tho employer is necessarily a monster seeking always to benefit himself at the expense of those who work for him. - It is not often, of course, that the relation of Capital and Labour is described quite so plainly as we have put it, but all the time by suggestion and innuendo the 'idea is con-

veyed by those who pose as the friends of Labour that Labour can hope for nothing from those who employ it. The effect of this has been

most harmful. It has not only aroused a spirit of strong antagonism where there is actual ground for grievance, but . has created an ever-widening under-current of feeling on both sides prejudicial _ to the interests of both and injurious to industrial development in directions likely to prove beneficial to the whole country. Looking at the situation squarely, what ical ground of complaint has the working man—we use the term in the trades unionist sense—with working conditions and wages in New Zealand »to-day? There may be isolated cases of hardship—no doubt there are—but taking Labour as a whole, can any fairminded person honestly contend that

there is any justification for the constant harping on the suggestion everlastingly put forward by Labour agitators, that Labour is not getting fair play \ And arc the men who persist in endeavouring to create this impression really serving the interests of those they profess to serve or anyone else—unless, perhaps, we except the paid advocates of trades unionism themselves? On the other hand, are they not, as we mentioned above, doing 'an immense amount of harm by driving the two parties which have so much in com-

mon into directly antagonistic camps'? But more than that; are they not checking the expansion of industry and deterring tho investment of fresh capital in new fields of enterprise; and by so doing limiting the field of employment for the very men whose interests the Labour agitator eo loudly proclaims his anxiety to serve 1 We do not think

there can bo any doubt as to the answers to these questions. It is a pleasant reflection, in one way, that Mr. W. T. Youxe should have to bewail .tho sparse attendance at

his election meetings. We should be pleased to regard it as an indication that in Labour circles the opinion is gaining ground that the ceaseless scolding of the employer docs no good to anyone, and that those who indulge in this form of oratory are not the real friends of Labour. By all means let the trades unionists and everyone else air their just grievances and demand fair conditions of labour, but the best way to have their demands met in a fair and reasonable spirit is not to be reached by prefacing such demands by constantly branding the whole race of employers as heartless, grasping people, Hind to all sense of justice and utterly callous of the well-being of those they employ.

Speaking at :i Chamber of Commerce mcL'tinc in Christ church nn Friday, JJr. \V. A.' Beddoe said Hint (hiring lialf a life-time's residence in Canada he had never heard even a. whisper of secession. The devotion of Canada to the Kmpire was in no way behind that of the other unit* of Empire, and he could assure his hearers that Ilie.-.e rumours of American leanings had no foundation in fact. Dr. Valiutine, Chief Health Officer has left for Auckland, where he will make full iaauiries regarding the plaguei