MEETING DENOUNCES NEW REGULATIONS

Grey River Argus, 15 March 1940, Page 9

MEETING DENOUNCES NEW REGULATIONS

International Notes

By

“Left Wing”

Says National Register is Step to Conscription

A packed meeting in the Trades Hall Wellington, last Sunday, held under the auspices of the Central Eranch*of the Wellington Peace and Anti-Con-scription Council, adopted the following resolution with only six dissentient votes:—

“That th s meeting of W.clling'on -ritizens endorses the aims of the Wellington Peace and Anti-Canscript i: n Council and draws attention to the fact that despite its constant promises to the contrary the Government has taken the first step to conscription hrough the National Register. “It emphatically protests against the Mayor’s incitement to disorder, against the police in arresting some speakers, against the condoning of disruptive elements in the arnwd forces by the military authorities, and against the suppression of even th. elements of democracy and freedom by the Government’s action in gazetting the recent Public Safety Emergency Regulations.” The collection amounted to over £9. (“People’s Voice,” Auckland). METAL TRADES AGAINST WAR. AUCKLAND. At its last meeting here the Metal Trades Council, representing a’l allied unions in the metal trades, including the engineers, the boilermakers and metal workers assistants, went on iecord against the imperialist war and against the official Federation of Labour policy of support for the war. It decided io endorse the remit already forwarded by the Boilermakers’ Union to the Federation of Labour Conference this month, whi-ffi will propose: "That this Conference express disapproval of the executive s manifesto concerning the present war, which we regard as imperialistic and against the interests of the world’s workers.” This is typical of the growing swing in trade union opinion here. It should be recalled that at the last meeting of the Trades Council here a resolution condemning the war as imperialist and warning the workers of the danger of a capitalist attack on the Soviet Union, received 38 votes and was defeated only by the casting vote of the chairman v of the meeting- — “People’s Voice.” 250,000 OPPOSE CONSCRIPTION, WAR. ("Peace News,” London). “The No Conscription League, which was founded in February, ;939, when it became apparent that the Government intended to introduce some measure of Military Conscription, to-day has an individual membership of over 6,000 organised in about 100 branches, and an affiliated membership of over a quarter of a million represented by 700 Trade Unions, Co-operative, Labour, Socialist, and Pacifist organisations, linked to it either nationally or local’y,” Mr Will Morris, secretary of the League, tells "Peace News.”

"At the same time,” says Mr Morris, "the scope of the League’s act’vities has necessarily been extended to oppose not merely Conscription but the war itself, and all that network of restrictions with which the ruling class must enmesh the workers if it is to wage effective war against totalitar.an Germany.” , He cited as examples of this ant’- ' working-class legislation the exemption of workshops from the operation of the Factories Act, 1937, by Regulation 59 of the Emergency Powers (Defence) Regulations; and Regulations 12 to 15, which prohibit entry to “protected places” and to the vicinity of “protected places” except under written permit, “These might be used to prevent the entry of Trade Union officials into such places for the purpose of negotiation, and to prevent peaceful picketing on the premises or land so scheduled.*' DANISH SEAMEN’S UNION GIVES TO COMMUNIST PAPER. COPENHAGEN, January 16. Defying the furious anti-Commun-ist, anti-Soviet campaign of the dominant capitalist and' Social-Democratic circles, the Copenhagen branch _ ol the Marine Firemen’s Union, has just decided to contribute 5000 kronen (about £250) to the Danish Communist newspaper, "Arbejderbladet.” The contribution, made from the union treasury, was voted at a membership meeting of the union to discuss tha international situation. The meeting also decided to raise a demand for a 100 per cent, war bonus increase for seamen as well as improved security measures. “The meeting instructs the leadership to transmit 5000 kronen from the union’s treasury to the ‘Arbejderbladet,’ since we are of the opinion that the newspaper must continue to appear in order to defend the cause of the working class as before,” said a resolution adopted at the meeting.

Labour Support of Mannerheim A CONDEMNATION. RJUKAN, Norway, January 22. A conference of members of the Social-Democratic organisation of this industrial city to-day voted a resolution condemning the official Labour Party sup'pfin of Mannerheim’s Finland. “The workers of Rjukan stand behind the Finnish workers and farmers fighting for their freedom and independence,” said the resolution. “The conference strongly protests against military assistance to the Whitl! Guard Finns, which can lead to a violation of the : neutrality of our country.” N.Z. Labour’s War Policy ONEKAKA critic. "We can fully endorse, so far as it goes, the statement upon Labour’s \var policy recently formulated by a Specially convened joint meeting of the National Executive of the Labour Party and the National Council of the Federation of Labour. The stptembnt expresses valuable principles. With its determination to assist in the

overthrow of Hitlerism, with its cm phasis upon the necessity for a “nei world order” ’as a condition of last ing peace, with its uneemprornisim opposition to conscription and with :t championship of ths rights of frecdor. of speech and opinion we heart ly c .n cur. Our criticism is concerned n. with what was said, but with who. was left unsaid.

In the first p’ace.. despite the ex plicit avowal by the Labour Move mint of a thoroughgoing Socialis philosophy, at no po nt are the bask principles ot Socialism given recogn. tion. In particular, there is to b. found in the statement no trace c that fundamental Socialist thesis, tha war is a necessary corollary to Cap italism. The draftsmen of Labour’s war policy, as the leaders Q.t though, and action within the Movement must surely be aware that so long a. the present economic system of the greater part, of the world —the system of Capitalism—determines the economic relationships between men and men and between nations and nations, so long will war remain an ever-re-current menace. Surely, if the New Zealand Labour Movement takes it: Socialist philosophy seriously—as something more than a mere form oi empty words— our War Policy shetik take note of this fundamental tht.ri and use it as a solid basis for positive and immediate proposals. Our Socialist faith is nothing to be ashamed of. So let us, with the Hon. Robert Semple, (when in Australia) "pro claim it from the housetops.”

Our second criticism is cone erne with the statement's failure to discus: the question of peace conditions, a. apart from peace aims. The ‘six principles of peace” incorporated. in the draft, which, have been lifted bodily and uncritically from a recent statement by the leader of the British Labour Party, do not of course answer this question. These formulas belong more properly to the realm of abstract ideals than to the world of immediate and pressing urgency. What is warned is a clear exposition of what, m the opinion of New Zealand Labour should be the conditions upon which peace, or at least an armistice, might be reached with Germany, One sucn condition, as is so often emphasised, is the existence in Germany of a government that we can “trust.” Labour should have something lo say upon this matter, because many people suspect that Chamberlain and Daladier might have difficulty, unaided by Labour promptings, in discerning “trustworthiness” in any government in. Germany except one sympathetic with their own political and economic beliefs. And at the same time it is essential to create in thminds of the German common people a commensurate “trust” in our own bona tides: Perfidious Albion itself has no clear conscience in the field m international relationships! T.n tins context the following extract from G. D. H. Cole’s ‘War Aims” has peculiar relevance: —"Our difficulty, in effect (says Mr Cole) in persuading the. German people of our good intentions is that Great Britain is not, in any thorough sense, a democracy, or devoted to the democratic cause. Mr Chamberlain is shocked much more by Hitler’s methods than by his ideas: he is outraged rather because Hitler has broken his word given at Munich than because he throws his opponents into concentration camps and suppiesses all liberty of opinion in the'name of the totalitarian State. In view ot his record, we assuredly cannot look to him to give the right lead for a revolt of the German people. Indeed what guarantee have the Germans now' that, if they were to revolt and throw off their oppressors, the Governments of France and Great Britain ■ would not serve them the same dirty trick as Lloyd George and Clemenceau served the German Socialists in 19187 T “It is for the parties of the Left, if the present Government (the Chamberlain Government) remains in power, to exact fmm if unequivocal pledges upon this point. If we are to work for an internal revolt in Germany—and why else have we been dropping leaflets instead of bombs? we must make plain not only that we will not treat for peace with the Nazis, but also that we treat, fairly l and honourably, with any other German Government, however far to the I,eft it may be, and whether or not Mr Chamberlain and Mr Montagu Norman approve of its economic attitude.” There can be no doubt that the Labour Movement of this Dominion, by adding its demand for such an unequivocal pledge, would be doing no more than its duty as a movement of the working-class. Furthermore, as we have already had occasion more than once to emphasise, we in New Zealand have a special obligation in this respect. We are a working-class in political power, and we can insist that our views be treated with respect. We ar? in a position, in a word, <o give an authoritative lead to the common people of the allied nations. Such a lead should be made in New Zealand Labour’s declaration of war policy. A third defect which strikes us forcibly in the Labour statement is the absence of any reference to the Soviet Union and.to the attitude oi New Zealand Labour to the threat of embroilment in a conflict with that State. Whatever may be said of the present activities of the U.S.S.R. in Finland (and indeed much is being said, significantly more than was everj said about the far more culpable acts of aggression in China, Abyssinia or Spain), the fact remains that Soviet Russia is the only workers’ State m the world, that, until finally disillusioned by the enmity and bad faith of the Capitalist “democracies,” she was the most faithful champion °- the principles of peace and collective, security, and that her . positive achievements for the emancipation of the common people have been enor • mous. Those achievements are facts,! and their integrity must be safeguard-! ed. Under no circumstances, therefore, must New Zealand allow itself to be enticed, cajoled or forced into’ participation in a mass attack by U Powers upon the Socialist system of the Soviet Union. A ready the forces of privilege and re j action are showing their teeth. Already the New Zealand Press gives delighted prominence and ed toria. approval to the Hore-Belishas of Capitalism in their policy of incitement against the workers’ State (what had

they to say aoout China, Abyssinia ox Spain?). The possibility of an attempt to ‘switch” the war against the U.S.S.R. must be faced. New Zealand Labour we submit, should repudiate any suggestion of sharing m an -attempt to overthrow socialism in thv Soviet Union. For not only would such a course be military madness, but would be a betrayal of everything for which Labour stands. On no account must any section of the workers allow themselves to be used, as tools in attacks upon working-class institutions. Our war policy must fearlessly assert determination to resist every attempt to involve us in a second war of intervention against the Soviet Union.—“ The Call,” Onekaka.