BETWEEN TWO MILLSTONES.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1361, 12 February 1912, Page 11

BETWEEN TWO MILLSTONES.

sfii; who j'.ws. (By Jennv Wren.) It is quite wonderful with what fortitude, toicration, and philosophy a large rfcction of llii" public of a country can watch tile progress of a content between two opposing lorces, employees and miploycrs, so long as they do nut realiso that ultimately the burden will fall upon their shoulders—that it is they who will be called upon to "pay! pay! pay!" Possibly it may take some time for that realisation to dawn fully upon tliein, but it will come, nevertheless. Wherever increased wages are demanded, and obtained—wages that arc out of proportion to the cost of production—the general public is called upon to pay, and it is usually the middle citizen—the man who is just able to make his way with the exorcise of prudence and self-denial—who pays the heaviest. That is, with one exception—his wife. However hard tile man may work, however strong his endurance, it is in most cases exceeded by that of the woman 1 Jell iml him, upon whose slender shoulder falls the ceaseless planning of trying to make every pound do the work of two, of anticipating the calls that the next week may bring upon them, of toiling her life away from morning to night, nil day, every day, the whole year round, till the wheel of life finally comes to a more or less welcome full-stop. That is where the burden lias fallen, and it threatens to pass beyond endurance. A Hollow Victory. Xo man, and certainly no woman, could face the prospect with any degree of equanimity of spending life in one perpetual struggle to make ends meet, to nave to count the cost of every pleasure and every relaxation, to be unable to give their children opportunities that wcultl enable them to hold their own .vitli some degree of success in a battle that is becoming more and more pitiless every year, and yet that is the prospect that is presenting itself before the great bulk of the population of the Dominion. Although in the recent conferences that have taken place between the waterside workers and their employers, and the seamen and the Union Steam Ship Company, the men have gained certain of their demands, their success in the end gains them absolutely nothing, as they are mado to pay largely in other ways. Tho unfortunate part "about it is that the men and women between these two millstones are victimised for no fault of their own, save perhaps their apathy. It is not a discriminating world, unfortunately, and the innocent have to suffer with others—and sometimes for them. Increased freights (the passenger rates are not so important) and landing charges do not look so formidable when they are viewed as written words only, but "it is when one comes to examine them, and all that is covered by them, that their meaning bemoces menacing. To begin with, it is estimated that every single thing that conies into th» country by shipping—and sinco an air service lias not yet been established everything lias to come that way—will have an increased cost put upon it to pay for the increased handling charges —it might be live, ten, or even twenty per cent, extra, according to whatever form the merchandise may take. The payer of these extra charges will certainly not be the wholesale or the retail firms—why should they be?—but, the unfortunate buyer, no matter what his station in lifo may be. Of course, the wealthier he is the ltss it will affect him. Where the Pinch Will Come.. New Zealand depends very largely upon tho produce and manufactures of other countries—how largely housewives will probably soon realise. Among the articles imported are tea, sugar, coffee, cocoa, fruit (from the Islands), spices, raisins, currants, tinned iish, cornflour, biscuits, fish, mustard, barley and all its kin, tobacco, alcoholic mid non-alcoholic beverages, drugs, medicines, chemicals and druggist's sundries, clothing and drapery (if hats have been the despair of scantily-furnished purses before, what will they be now?), paper manufactures and stationery, bicycles, to say nothing of motors, cartridge-eases, cutlery, ironmongery, and various forms of metal manufactures, articles made from timber, textile fabrics, umbrellas, boots, shoes, harness, trunks, travelling bags, and leather manufactures generally (including goloshes), furniture and household furnishing, china, glass, and earthern goods, fancy goods, and musical instruments, tobacco pipes, and eases', fishing tackle, oils and paints, (igricultural and farm products. For all these things we, tho meek, longsuffering public will have to pay yet a little more, to meet these increased wharf charges. In some eases that increased charge may not come under the heading of "little," but, at any rate, a little extra here and there upon nearly everything we need in daily life soon mounts up and becomes intolerable., Jt is an interesting question as to whether the last straw lias been reached. Who Makes the Trouble? To men like some of those who held forth in the Basin Reserve recently these things are largely owing, though probably tho women presrnt at that meeting little realised it. To their stirring np of strife, of fomenting bad feeling between employees and employers, to the fact of their doing their best to antagonize clots against class, much of this growing cost of living is due, and it is to bo hoped that the men whom they lead will soon recognise that such is the ease. It is a. very unsatisfactory world that jogs along nt sixes and sevens, and. in any case, if it comcs to a determined struggle between labour and the employers of labour, it is the latter that must inevitably win, general strike or 110. Such, for instance was the case in tl'o genxral strike which took place in Sweden in 1909.

On that occasion gas and electric light employers struck, sailors and stokers of passenger steamers ceased work, tramcars did not run. all street traffic was suspended. Trade of all kinds was almost at a standstill. An unsuccessful attempt, was made to 111dure farm labourers to join the strike, and so to prevent the gathering of the harvest. This attempt failed, and m the towns bv September 1 (the strike having begun on August ■(), trams and ferries were running, and the necessaries of lifo were being supplied. This result was accomplished by an association of volunteers, to which all clashes contributed their quota—counts and barons, officers, professional and business men, engineers, clerks, and students. The middle classes seem in Sweden at least to have sbown their spirit in an emcrirency. but it is to bo observed that the Government protected willing workers.