MAY DAY MEETING

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 186, 4 May 1937, Page 2

MAY DAY MEETING

Resolutions Adopted By Wellington Gathering May D;y was celebrated in Wellington on Sunday by a public meeting in the Trades Hall under the chairmanship of Mr. J. Moulton, secretary of the carpenters’ union. The speakers were: Mr. W. O'Reilly, secretary of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement; Mrs. E. McGowan, secretary of the Wellington Spanish medical aid committee; Mr. C. Gough, secretary of the Dairy Workers’ Union: Mr. Gerald Griffin, Friends of the Soviet Union ; and Mr. Alex Gailbraith, Communist Party. A motion of solidarity was passed with the Spanish toilers and people in their fight against Fascism and for their democratic liberties, and greetings were extended to the German toilers in their fight against Nazism and for the liberation of political prisoners and the work-ing-class leader, Thaleman. A protest was made against the proposed propaganda tour of Count von Luekner, and it was later agreed by the meeting that this protest should be registered by trade unions following the example set by the Australian trade unions. Another resolution adopted read as follows: “This meeting views with horror the recent murderous bombing of Guernicia and other Spanish towns by German aeroplanes directed by General Franco and his allies. It deplores the apathy of the British Tory Government and its shameful treatment of the legitimate .Spanish Government, to which it persistently refuses the right, pertaining under international law. We call upon the New Zealand Government, as the representatives of a sovereign democratic State, to protest to the British. German and Italian Governments against the violation of the legal and moral rights of the Spanish people. In particular, we urge our Labour Government to make representations to the Imperial Government of Great Britain in order that the Spanish democracy be granted the full assistance to which it is entitled under international law and under the Covenant of the League of Nations.”