TRADE UNIONS

Grey River Argus, 16 May 1935, Page 8

TRADE UNIONS

OF FIRST IMPORTANCE. It cannot be repeated too often nor emphasised too strongly that organisations of wage workers —trade unions are of first importance in our industrial scheme. Without their organisation the worker is a cipher; he is but a pawn in the hands of those who control industry. Men have spent their lives in hopes and struggles for betterment of conditions, and their time has been wasted until they joined hands with their fellows and aete.l collectively and concertedly. No ideal can be realised, no wrong can be righted, without the_ compelling power of united action. No man can be a free agent unless he acts with and has the support of his contemporaries. Yet such is the composition of our human mind and so insidious is the propaganda of the controllers of industry that men must be shown again and again that there is no royal road to better conditions; constant vigilance and unceasing conflict are necessary to gain every advance. The welfare and the very lives of the wage worker and his family are under the control of those few individuals who contsitute the financial or employing element of our society. They have their organisations which function with all means of aid at their command. It is futile to imagine that they will surrender that control without a severe struggle. They will only yield when compelled to do so and by an intelligently directed power. Company unions, bonuses, employee-ownership are but camouflage to cover the iron first that lies concealed. Power, profit, dividends, those are the motives driving the industrial autocrat to a disregard of the human element involved in employment. And there is but one salvation for the worker —organisation. Once organised. once agreed to put aside petty presonai grievances and strive forward with their co-workers for the greater , good of all, with intelligence, forbearance and firmness —and keeping organised—that is the only means by which labour can gain and keep those privileges to which it is rightfully entitled. From the Trades and Labour Council Journal of South Africa.