STRIKE SPIRIT DYING OUT

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 74, 24 September 1912, Page 3

STRIKE SPIRIT DYING OUT

UNITED LABOUR OFFICIAL'S OPINION TRIBUTE TO POLICE. (BT TKLEGBAPJtt— SPECIAL TO THE POST.) AUCKLAND. This Day. In a review of the position at Waihi I given to a Herald representative, Mr. T. Walsh, secretary of the Auckland District Council of the United Labour j Party, who has been for some time in ' Waihi investigating matters, said that I the result of his enquiries among the men showed him clearly that, in spite of assertions to the contrary, the strike j spirit is very rapidly dying out at Waihi, and it was his opinion that a very few weeks would see the end of it and work going on again in full swing. Almost everybody in the Waihi district was thoroughly tired of the strike, and wished it was at an end, and it was quite common to hear men who were " out " saying ' that if someone would start the mines they would go back again at once. From the beginning, he said, the strike had been run on the lines associated with the policy of what is known as the ," 1.W.W." This organisation was the lineal descendant of the old anarchist party of the Old World, and, regarding all law with hatred, was prepared to take any steps to oppose it. They regarded the strike as the chief instrument for the amelioration of the evils from which the working class suffers. Indeed, they regarded strikes as the means by which even government itself should be effected. The Syndicalists who headed the strike at Waihi had used such tactics as the abuse and annoyance of men who wanted to work', and might, if it had not been ifor the presence of the police, have attacked the property of the employers as well. Regarding the formation of the Engine-drivers' Union, Mr. Walsh said that for about three years attempts had been *made to form an Enginedrivers' Association, because the enginedrivers felt that they had not been given fair treatment by the Waihi Miners and Workers' Union. The position was recognised by the 'Waiht Union, which I about two years ago held a coafersnee^

and promised to rectify matters for the engine-drivers, though it had not carried out the ptomise. The separation of the engine-drivers and the formation of a new body was exactly analogous with what had happened in Australia in the formation of the Engine-drivers' Association. The Australian engine-drivers in their own interests found that they had to secede and make an organisation of their own. It was quite absurd for the Syndicalists and their followers to call their opponents in Waihi " scabs," for that term was only applicable to nonunionists who wanted to work in place of unionists, and these men were all good unionists. Mr. Walsh said that the conduct of the police at Waihi seemed to him to be admirable and deserving of all praise. They were scrupulously careful to avoid any irritation or conflict. At the Magisterial enquiries the strikers had had a most patient and Uhbiased hearing from the Alagistrate, and Mr. Fraiser had allowed them the utmost freedom in connection with the Court cases.