THE WORKING CLASSES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1322, 24 November 1864, Page 5

THE WORKING CLASSES.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LYTTELTON TIMES.

Sir,—l felt indignant, but not surprised, at your leading article of last Saturday's issue; for it is an undeniable fact that you have for a long period persistently opposed the interests of working men. By your advocacy of immigration, and the glowing accounts you have given in the monthly summaries at various times of the happy condition and bright prospects of working men in New Zealand, you have done iiluch to bring about the present state of things, and have induced many an honest, hard-working man to break up his home in England, to his fortune on these shores, and lie finds on his arrival, at least at this time, that their condition is little, if any, better than the working men's of England. And even now, at this crisis, when distress deep and real exists, because we call a public meeting to devise the best means to alleviate that distress, you tell us that there is none, and that our complaints are unfounded. I maintain, sir, that you have 110 right to make such an assertion until you go round and enquire into each individual case. You may then arrive at some approximation to the truth. We are not idiots—we know when we are hungry or thirsty; and we know when our cause is just, better than you can tell us. If no distress existed, no public meeting would have been called, for working men are generally slow to make their grievances publicly known. And this is the reason why the winter has been allowed to pass without public attention being drawn to our condition. But you' say that the men who asserted that they were in absolute want scorned to receive five shillings a day for their labour, as if that was any argument that distress did not exist. Such illogical reasoning is easily refuted. I may refer you to the strikes made by working men in England, who have endured the greatest suffering and the utmost privation, sooner than work for a reduced rate of wages. And it is the case here. Want is felt, but the men are loth to accept the rate of wages offered. And quite right too. All honour to the men who resist such tyranny and oppression, for it is nothing else. We came out here, misled by the misrepresentations received at home,with the expectation that we should receive a fair .remuneration for our toil, and be enabled to live in comfort; and what is the result ? We are offered five shillings per day—a rate that can ill afford a bare sustenance, especially to a married man. And this, it is said, is offered out of charity. Such an assertion is enough to make our blood boil. Talk of charity in a young colony like this, where the Go--vernment has been offering every inducement for working men to leave their home in England, that they might be able to improve their condition here, and who are still voting immense sums of money for the same purpose. Surely it would be more charitable if the Government, instead of spending their money to bring so many people out, who will on their arrival be sure to experience the same disappointment as ourselves, would spend it in finding employment for the surplus hands already here. We ought not to ask this as a favour, but demand it as aright; and depend upon it, if things remain as they are, the Canterbury workmen will not be long before they do so. Your remarks respecting the Lancashire immigrants are extremely unjust. You seem to think that many of them are incapable of doing a fair day's work. I beg leave to differ from you. Most of them are capable of doing a fair day's work for & fair day's pay, if they could only get it. And it is not right of you to be constantly reminding them that they were brought out from purely charitable motives. Nothing could be more aggravating or hurtful to their feelings than this, especially as the Government understood the nature of their employment in England, and might naturally suppose that some of them would be a long time before they could adapt themselves to colonial life. By inserting the above in your paper you will much oblige Yours, &c., WM. HARRISON. Lincoln road, Nov. 21. [Like most angry men the writer of this letter makes a bad advocate. He accuses some one—we suppose the Government—of tyranny and oppression in offering to those whom he positively asserts to be suffering from the utmost privation, a wage of five shillings a day ; and yet he cannot see the tyranny and oppression he is guilty of to the great mass of the over tasked and ill-paid working men of the world, when he says—we will have no more of you here, we hold possession of this land and mean to keep it for ourselves. The writer reproaches us with having tempted many an honest hard working man to leave his home and settle in Canterbury. He could not have paid us a greater compliment,in proof of which we point to the present condition of the thousands of honest hard working men who form the population of Canterbury.—Ed. L. 7 1 .]