MINISTER'S PLEA

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 132, 1 December 1938, Page 20

MINISTER'S PLEA

STRIKES CONDEMNED

HARM TO GOVERNMENT

(By Telegraph—Press Aseoclation.)

WESTPORT, November 30,

The Minister of Mines (the Hon. P. C. Webb) delivered a special message to the' "boys in the mines" on Tuesday evening, at a social gathering held by the Hector branch of the Labour Party.

"Don't get heated," he said, "at trivial questions. Remember that every day you go on strike it is recorded against the Labour Government."

He urged miners and all other unions not to take- matters into their own hands when a dispute cropped up, but to carry on work under protest and allow the dispute to be put through the right channel. It was not right to strike. . There undoubtedly were heart burns at some treatment, but they should not be allowed to get in the way of the work.

Why stop work at these things? If miners had disputes they should let the federation deal with the matter. Going on strike did not help any union, he said, and reflected on the Government.

- During his term of office as Minister of Mines, he- had done his best to assure a state of economy. He had done his best to keep Australian coal out of the country to allow more working in New Zealand mines, and unless his work for providing better and more work for the miners was recognised by the miners themselves it showed that his efforts were not appreciated fully. If New Zealand could not produce bituminous coal, that coal would have to come into the country from abroad.. When miners kept stopping on trivial questions in this district they were " doing themselves no good, the Government harm, and were crippling the main industryl of the place.