NEW AUSTRALIANS QUICKLY LEARN WAY OF LIFE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23023, 13 August 1949, Page 5

NEW AUSTRALIANS QUICKLY LEARN WAY OF LIFE

CANBERRA, Aug. 11. A few hours after the Minister of Immigration, Mr. A. A. Calwell, had launched a campaign to outlaw the terms “displaced persons" and “Balts” and to call European migrants "new Australians,” 25 of the latter and 15 "old Australians” went on strike at Mulwala House, a hostel controlled by the Department of the Interior.

The employees’ action was taken when the manager of the hostel, with the approval of the Conciliation Commissioner, refused to reinstate a “new Australian housemaid who had been dismissed for alleged insubordination. A general strike in the five hotels and fifteen hostels of Canberra is now threatened. The 200 guests at Mulwala House are cooking and serving their own meals.

“It shows that the ‘new Australians’ are learning our way of life quickly enough to earn Mr. Calwell’s new title.” comments a correspondent. A meeting of about 150 members of the Canberra branch of the Liquor and Allied Trades Union decided that the staff of Mulwala House should stay on strike.

At least 50 people who attended the meeting were Balts all of whom were members of the domestic staffs employed in Canberra hotels and hostels. The meeting gave the Department of the Interior 24 hours to remove the manager from the hostel, failing which all other union members in the capital territory would strike. Only half those present voted.