TRADES UNIONS AND POLITICS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1142, 1 June 1911, Page 5

TRADES UNIONS AND POLITICS.

THE OSBORNE JUDGMENT. BRITISH GOVERNMENT BILL READ A SECOND TIME. "SATISFIES NOBODY.' 1 By Telegraph—Press Association-Copyricht London, May 30. Tho Attorney-General (Sir Rufus Isaacs) moved in the House of Commons tho second reading of the "Osborne" Bill, which enables a union, after a eecret ballot (superintended by tho Registrar of Friendly Societies), to. apply its funds for political and municipal purposes. MR. CHURCHILL ON BIASED COURTS. THE RIGHTS OF MINORITIES. London, May 31. The House of Commons carried tho second reading of the Osborne Bill by 219 votes to 18. Mr. E. F. E. Smith, Unionist member for Walton Division of Liverpool, said tho Bill would satisfy nobody. The protection provided for minorities was illusory. Mr. Ramsay Macdonald, Leader of tho Labour party, complained regarding tho rights given to minorities, but said ho believed the Bill amendable. Mr. Winston Churchill, Home Secretary, evoked a demonstration of disapproval by expressing the opinion that the Courts were biased, doubtless unconsciously, in dealing with questions involving class and party issues. The Government were erecting a bulwark between the Courts and the unions. The "Daily Chronicle" (Liberal) draws attention to the danger lurking in the Government's Osborne Bill, and says that trade unions.are net necessarily workmen's combinations, as the masters may bo registered as trade unions under the Act if their principal object be the regulations of the relations- between masters and workmen. The present Bill, therefore, authorises the masters to raise a political fund to pay Parliamentary candidates' expenses.