"HARMFUL INSURGENCY"

Evening Star, Issue 25396, 30 January 1945, Page 7

"HARMFUL INSURGENCY"

Minister comments on railway STRIKE j HALT MUST BE GALLED (I\A.) WELLINGTON, Jan. 29. "1 hope that the section of railwaymen who went on strike have now recognised the foolishness of their action," said the Minister of• Railways, Air Semple, to-day. There was not a shred of justification for the strike. The Minister said that the men, through their own organisations, had been given the full benefit of the Government's policy of giving every worker and association of workers the right to state their grievances and have them righted through reasonable and constitutional channels. Though the right and privilege of submitting claims to the special tribunal was utilised thoroughly by the railwaymen's organisations,' it was flagrantly abused by an impatient, impetuous, and unthinking minority. They had preferred to endeavour to use the bludgeon, and had failed to realise that they could in the issue only clout their own heads. It was a matter for gratification that a majority of the railwaymen had refused to let reason and common sense be overthrown. The Minister added that a halt must be called to industrial irresponsibility and harmful insurgency. The men fighting overseas and those who had returned from service had never complained about their conditions in front of the enemy. Was it too much to ask all workers in this relatively peaceful country to do the same and to do never less than their best to maintain untarnished New Zealand's great war effort?