STRIKE PROVOKERS.

Evening Star, Issue 21636, 3 February 1934, Page 13

STRIKE PROVOKERS.

TO THE EDITOR.Sir,—Your sub-leader of yesterday on, ‘ Strike Provokers - does you little credit. • It seems a low-down effort to rouse a bad feeling against the officials of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement. Let me state the case for the taking of the ballot. As a member of. the executive of the Dunedin branch of that movement I have, in common with the other members, always endeavoured to obtain an expression of opinion from the rank and file in respect to any mass action. . Hence the taking of the ballot. But why, you may ask, a move towards a strike? What is the urge ? You answer in one place, that this is found in the existence of Communists. among the unemployed. But I think it is to be found in your admission that “ The relief pay which they (the relief workers) receive is pitifully small.” But you proceed to belittle the significance of this admission by stating that the fund is not bottomless. Of course, there is no such thing as a bottomless fund.. Quite true. You will have to admit, however, that had there been the will to do it on the part of the Government, it could have been made a great deal deeper. _ Further, as showing the cruel operation of the Act, you yourself, perhaps unwittingly, have supplied the proof in that “ A good number of those contributing to it (the fund) have not much more (than the relief worker) at the' end of a full week’s work, whiclr they can call their own.”. True again. The poor have been compelled to support the poor. This obscures the fact that the rich have not been compelled and are left with a very great deal more after paying their taxes. The half loaf is indeed beter than no bread, but when it is recognised that the half loaf is galloping to the quarter stage, it surely is suicidal not to make a stand, particularly when it is fully evident that an abundance of good things exist in this very rich country of New Zealand. I can see' unavoidable poverty and want only in a country, where there is a scarcity of such things as' wool, butter, cheese, eggs, and wheat, but this is not in New Zealand. Of course; it is impossible for you to understand the reasonings that could ever recommend a strike. The spirit of hopelessness, which leads to desperate moves, and which is gripping the souls of the intelligent of relief gangs, is foreign to your environment. You say “ a proportion of the least responsible have been doing their utmost to produce a strike.” The answer to that is that the initiative in strike action was backed by 99 per cent, of relief workers in Gisborne. Their case is backed by the inhabitants of that town, as is witnessed by their magnificent rally in the matter of provisioning the strikers. Let me state, in conclusion, that our local executive is composed, with one exception, of non-Communists. This is the position in most other centres. Some members of Parliament are, to judge by their utterances, almost on the brink of. advising unconstitutional action.—l am, etc., John Gilchrist. February 3.