THE LABOUR MOVEMENT

Evening Star, Issue 21622, 18 January 1934, Page 3

THE LABOUR MOVEMENT

[By J.S.S.]

Brief contributions on matters with reference to the Labour Movement are invited. SHOP ASSISTANTS’ NEW AGREEMENT. ,A feature of the new agreement for shop assistants, which covers Otago and Southland as well as the northern centres, is the retention of the existing minimum wage for senior males and females, storemen, packers, and porters. This is generally regarded by the unions as satisfactory. With respect to junior assistants, the employers in their first claims made an application to extend the startitig age from under sixteen .roars to under eighteen years, which meant that workers who were approaching eighteen years of age could be employed at the same rate of wages as those under sixteen, years., This would have meant a reduction in wages of os a week. There were also a number of other clauses contained in the employers’ proposals which were unacceptable to the unions. Tl’o first conciliation sitting affecting the Wellington Union was held on November 7, when no agreement could he reached. The second sitting was held on November 21, when the workers' union submitted the final conditions they were prepared to accept, and a further adjournment, was agreed upon to enable the employers to submit those proposals to their associations. “At this stage,” comments a union secretary. “ the dispute was handed over to the Workers’ Preferential Trading Committee (composed of delegates from the District Council of the Alliance of Labour and the Wellington Trades and Labour Council). This committee decided on a line of action which was considered advisable under the circumstances. with the result, that the unions were able to come to an agreement with the employers which wa? deemed satisfactory by the unions and the Preferential Trading Committee.” • • • CHILD LABOUR DAY. Following its custom of pearly .thirty years the United States National Child Labour Committee *has- designated the week-eud of January 27-29 as the period for the observance of Child Labour Day. This year,’ the committee states, the occasion should he one of rejoicing for the child labour victories, gained tlirough the industrial codes, tempered by the knowledge that hundreds of thousands of children engaged in industrialised agriculture, domestic, service, and certain forms of industrial home work and street trades are not protected by any code. It is estimated that the industrial codes have released 100,000 children'nnder sixteen years from industry Another 30,000 boys and girls sixteen to eighteen years old have been removed from especially hazardous work. On the other hand, there are still approximately- 240.000 children under sixteen years working in occupations not covered by codes. These children are employed largely in industrialised agriculture, such as the production of sugar beet, cotton, tobacco, and truck farm products, in street trades (especially newspaper selling), and in domestic service. • • • • WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE. ' It was a coincidence (says the Melbourne ‘ Age ’) that on the very day when -the first woman member of the Victorian Parliament was sworn in as a member of the Legislative Assembly a small exhibition of pictures and documents relating to the early struggles of the woman’s suffrage movement should have been opened at the club rooms of the Victorian Women Citizens’ Move-, ment. Photographs were both amusing and tragic. There were the early workers for the enfranchisement of women in Australia and in England, dressed in what seems to the present generation as most curious garments and laughable hats. There are pictures of those amazing processions in which the suffragettes marched through the streets of London at the height of the militants’ campaign. There is a picture of a crowd silently awaiting the passing of the funeral of Emily Davidson, who was killed when she flung herself in front of the King’s horse in the Derby; and another of Lady Constance Lytton, who .died as a result of forcible feeding while in prison. « * « « ' AGAINST WAR. Paralysing of France by a, general strike of all unions from hairdressers to school teachers as a last attempt to stop a war has been sanctioned by the French General Labour Federation. This demonstration that, in the words of the French Confederation’s own ultimatum, it is “ the unchanging call of the proletariat not to go to war,” is the latest development in a growing resistance to war among Labour groups. The British Labour Party at its amiual conference in October last unanimously resolved to take no part "in any future war ); and, if necessary, to adopt a general strike to prevent hostilities. The voting strength of the Labour Party in , time of defeat two years ago was 6.500.000, and it normally polls around 8.000. votes. The forerunner of the stand of the French General Labour Federation was a- resolution recently passed by the French Union of Teachers, which declared for a general strike in case of war. c lf the organisation as a whole followed through on this statement 600,000 would refuse mobilisation. • • • • AMERICAN SOCIALIST MAYOR. Jasper M'Levy, prominent Socialist and trade unionist, was elected Mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut’s (U.S.A.) chief industrial city, by a plurality of more than 5,000. The first New England Socialist Mayor, he swept twelve of the sixteen aldermen elected into office with him, and Socialists received every minor administrative office. The Socialists, however, did not gain complete control of the aldermanic body, since there remained in office nine Democrats and three Republicans who did not have to run for re-election. Bridgeport is a city of 150,000, and is commonly called the industrial capital of Connecticut. Out of a total registration of 50,000 46,000 votes were cast. M'Levy received 22,546: James L. Dunn, Democrat, prominent manufacturer, and John H. Schjvarz, Republican, owner of a large lumber yard, 7,529. M'Levy, a journeyman roofer, is a former president of the International Union of Journeymen Slate and Tile Roofers and of the Connecticut Federation of Labour. He is a member of the National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party. • • • NOTED LABOUR WOMAN. Senator Heuriette ,Crone, the leader of the Labour women’s movement in Denmark, died in Copenhagen on October 10 from heart failure. She began her remarkably successful career in the women’s Labour move-

meat as a trade union organiser, and particularly as organiser of the women’s section of the Compositors’ Society, of which she was founder and** president. Although she was never a fanatical upholder of women’s rights—she was a consistent supporter of the principle of a common organisation for men and women—she defended the rights of women, and particularly of working women, energetically and effectively. As a result of the confidence that the wonjen trade unionists showed in her she was appointed a member of the International Labour Office’s Consultative Committee on Women’s Questions, in the work of which she participated very actively and with great interest. She was also a loyal and indefatigable worker for the party, and held many responsible posts in it. Since 1920 she was a member of the Danish. Senate*