UNION WITH ALLIANCE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIII, Issue 421, 12 June 1922, Page 3

UNION WITH ALLIANCE.

/THE T. AND T. OFFICER.S

PETITIONS TO PARLIAMENT

BOTH SIDES OF QUESTION

WELLINGTON, June 8,

When announcing tin* withdrawal of the proposal of immediate alliliaiion with the Alliance of Labour the executive of the Post and Telegraph Officers’ Association slated its intention to petition Parliament protesting against the refusal of the Government to permit the affiliation. It appears now that Parliament will receive two petitions on the subject, since a petition is being circulated among the officers of the Post and Telegraph Department asking that affiliation shall not be permitted. Attached to this petition is a paper giving figures in connection with the ballot that resulted in the endorsement of the alliliaiion proposal. They show that the total strength of the stall', 'permanent and casual, at the time of the ballot was 8848. The number of votes recorded in favour of affiliation was 4379, leaving 4469 officers who either did not vote or voted against affiliation. The secretary of the Poet and Telegraph Association, Mr it. E. Combs, said to-day that he believed this petition was being circulated “with the knowledge and probably the approval of the department.’’ He stated that certain officers in the Wellington office had keen detached from their ordinary duty to take the petition round, and he suggested that there was a feeling that men who refused to sign might be “marked.’ A reporter who made inquiries on the subject was informed that the new petition was in no sense official. A strong minority ot members of the association, including apparently a majority of the senior officers, has opposed the affiliation proposal at all stages. Some 2000 members of the service who do nut belong to the association had no opportunity of expressing any opinion at all at the time of the ballot. The opponents of affiliation desire that their views shall be placed before Parliament when the request of tile pro-affiliation body is being considered, and hence/hey have brought forward ti second petition. The two petitions that will reach Parliament will represent the divergent opinions within the stall' of ties department, and neither of them will have any official status.