THE STRIKE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 8544, 26 March 1908, Page 2

THE STRIKE.

.. * j PROSPECTS OF SETTLEMENT. Per Press Association GREYMOUTH, March 25. There are no new developments in coimcction with strike matters at Blackball. The statement that negotiations are proceeding for settlement seem to have no foundation as far as the local management is concerned. The manager, on being interviewed, states that ije has had no conference with the Union for weeks, and can only account for the statement by suggesting that the directors in Christchurch might bo moving in that direction. There has been no further meeting of the Union and the matters remain unchanged. DUNEDIN, March 25. W. K. Pritchard one of the delegates appointed by the Blackball Union to deliver addresses in various parts of the Dominion on the Blackball strike and what led up to it, arrived in Dunedin this evening. When interviewed he said that the union would certainly bo unanimous in sticking out for what it had d-emanded. The workers were determined not to go back until they "were conceded half an hour for crib. He was also positive the men would go to gaol in preference to paying the fine. Subscriptions received to date as a re-, suit of addresses amount to just on £200. Pritchard pays his own expenses. Ho made a statement that, from prixate information he was possessed of and which he was not in a position to divulge, he would not be surprised if ho received a wire at any time that the j strike was (settled. ■ AUCKLAND.. March 25. In the course of a spec'h at Onelmnga to-night (in reply to Mr Massey's Hamilton speech). Sir Joseph Ward referred to arbitration. He said he would not S at that juncture refer to the Blackball strike, except to say he deeply regretted it had occurred, and no man was a wellwisher of the miners who advised them to take the course they had taken. He was opposed to imprisonment, and recognised that an amendment in the law in this direction was necessary. Parliament must consider a scheme to remove anything like a dead l<e%"el from the Court awards, so that an individual working harder or more scientifically than his fellows should receive, the benefit of his labours.