An Interview with Champion.

Evening Star, Issue 8553, 27 June 1891, Page 1 (Supplement)

An Interview with Champion.

On arrival in London Mr Champion was) interviewed by a representative of the *PalI Mall Gazette' on his colonial experience!. Inter alia he said: "Events seem to have jostified your action with regard to the Australian strike last autumn!"—" It was a diffionlt podtfos for me, yon see. The men were entirely in the wrong, and the rank and file were blindly following incapable and unscrupuloM leaders to a disaster. I suppose it would have been politic for me to have held my tonque altogether, or to have shouted with the crowd, while evading any responsibility on the ground that I was a ' new chum,'and unacquainted with the facts. But I never was 'politic' in that sense, and always disagreed with the French demagogue who, when remonstrated with for not reproving the excesses of his followers, remarked: ' Bat I must follow them because I am their leader.' So I did what one man might to save them from themselves."

"Didn't yon find that rather an unpleasant task ?"—" The men who pulled the strings out there didn't appreciate my candor, very naturally, and expressed their disapprobation in the usual manner of persons who can't defend their case by argument. But yon know," said Mr ChampioD, with a smile, " I am pretty well accustomed to that sort of thing— 4 fighting with wild beasts at Ephesus,' so to speak, is rather a favorite amusement with me. They finally publicly acknowledged that they could not get the better of me, and gave up abusing me as a hopeless job. A great many of the Trades Hall delegates whom I met afterwards frankly admitted that I was right, and wished my advice had been taken in the spirit in which it was offered." "And if it had been taken?"—"Von remember I wrote an article early in September in the Melbourne * Age' showing the way out of the difficulty. lam told that it has since been reprinted by the Shipping Federation here, and largely distributed. In spite of its great length that article was republished in every capital city in Australia, and all the papers, of every shade of opinion, hailed it as a just and fair statement of the rather complicated difficulty. It was quoted aud approved by members both of the Government and of the Opposition in every Parliament in Australia and New Zealand. So it may fairly be said that, but for the vanity of the strike leaders, my settlement would have been accepted. That would have saved the colonies enormous loss and the Australian workmen nearly a couple of millions in wages, and, mote important still, have prevented the disruption of the federations of labor."

" And what do your old friends over here think of it all?"— "I really don't know. The leaders of the men here could hardly have behaved otherwise than they did nnlen they had had deep insight and moral courage, and I am afraid these are not their strong points. It is perhaps the exception that proves the rule about a prophet having no honor in bis own country—that the Trades Council of the town in which my father was born have sent me a resolution expressing their conviction that ' the course Mr Champion pursued in the Australian strike was a true, just, and proper one, and one entirely in the interests of true trade unionism.' That seems to have been carried by three to one, the minority favoring an amendment to the efftct that ' Mr Champion did the best he could under the circumstances/ So far as I can gather during the few days I have been back, there are a good many people of the same opinion, though they may not think it ' politic' to say bo, But in any case I don't see any reason to regret one word or action of mine in the whole business."

"In fact, you are pleased with yourself if nobody else is—which, by the way, iB not an uncommon frame of mind with you if all that has been said about you is true?"— Mr Champion laughed: "I don't mind admitting that if I could manage to be satisfied with my own actions criticisms from outside would not trouble me very much, But lam not above learning or modifying my opinion! in accordance with new facts. And I have come across a good muny. I have watched a Legislature composed of paid members, and studied the development and administration of a railway system by the State ; and I cannot honestly say that I have been altogether favorably impressed by either. Also I have seen Protection in a thoroughly democratic community, and observed the effects of mere material prosperity on workmen of British breed. Altogether I have learned so much that, though I am a poor man, I am quite willing to head a fund for sending political candidates to Australia for a twelvemonth. It would do them a world of good." " And what struck you most, if that is a question possible to answer ?" —" I should thiak that on the whole the matter of most immediate importance is the development of the country by the irrigation of which Mr Deakin is the great political exponent. I went over the two fruitgrowing colonies just before leaving Australia, and investigated the whole thing thoroughly, and became something of an enthusiast over it. There's room there for millions of Britons to find a pleasant and profitable career."