TRADES COUNCIL.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 40, 17 February 1911, Page 2

TRADES COUNCIL.

■an. t — There was an attendance of thiriyejght^ delegates, besides seveial visiting unionists, at the weekly meeting of the Wellington Trades and Labour Council, held last night, over which Mr. E. J. Carey presided. Mr. W. Gibsc-n, a retired Kaikouru farmer, addressed the delegateis- on tho land question, describing the early agitation that led up to th© lands for settlement policy, and .the methods of cutting up estates that followed Mr. Gibson was thanked for his address. A letter was leceived from the Wool and Grain Stores Employees' "Union, recommending the appointment of Mr. 13. M. Findlay as legal adviser to the council and affiliated unions, and was referred to the management committee to report upon. It was reported that Mr. J. Revell, of i Christchurch, had been successful in inaugurating a Woollen Mills Employees' Union, at Petone. Mr. D. M'Laren reported that up to the present no union j had been formed in Auckland for the i industry, and it was decided to recom- j mend the Auckland lrad.es Council to further the interests of euch employees. On the motion of Mr. W. T. Young (Seamen'e Union), it waa decided that the next meeting of the council should be a special one to alter th^ rules of the council co as to provide" that delegates of unions, before, being accepted as reprasenta'civ-es of their unions, be required to sign a pledge, of loyalty to the decisions and constitution of the council. The voting was 24 for and 4 against. Messrs. M'Laren, Kay, and Stott were appointed a committee to assist th® unions at Petone in organising the. workers in that district.

The -Government has purchased for close settlement 3300 acres of the Waihao Downs .Estate in the Waimate County, the price being £19 2s 6d per acre. The Waimate Advertiser states that the news was received with great satisfaction, as it means that about 5500 acres in all, embracing the Stoney Creek and Serpentine valley freeholds, will be cut up for close settlement and occupied by the actual settlers before next spring. The Serpertine Valley land, it says, has been described as of the finest quality in New Zealand. There are some rough portions on the Stonoy Creek Estate, but, with due allowance for those, the combined properties ought, 111 the opinion of experts, to o\.t up into farms as small as 120 acres on the average. Much of the Waihao Dc-wns land would pay if as small as 75 acres, it being so handy to road and railway, and so uniformly productive. The paper waxes enthusiastic over the prospect, stating that thirty new families in the Downs 'district should make their presence felt in a very short timo^ -- 1