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Maoriland Worker, Volume 13, Issue 31, 1 August 1923, Page 4

Rumour lias it that the Government's Electoral Bill, shortly to be Introduced, provides for the application of-proportional representation to the town constituencies while continuing the first-past-the-post system: in the country. If rumour is correct, the Bill is simply an atrocious electoral swindle. The object of such a measure, the original responsibility for which must be laid on Mr. Downie Stewart, has not the least relation to the rights of the public, but is only concerned to effect a gross partisan advantage and sustain the power of the Massey Party. Having enjoyed power by the agency of an electoral absurdity which "has conferred Parliamentary majorities on a party hopelessly in a minority in the constituencies, and having nearly run the length of its tether, the Massey Party hopes to gain a further lease of office by a crafty device'concocted deliberately to do injustice to political organisations opposed to it. What it aims at with this Bill is to secure proportional representation to Tory minorities in the urban areas while denying similar justice to Labour minorities in the rural districts, hi other words, its only notion of electoral reform is on a par with, tossing a double-headed penny, on the " heads-I-win-tails-you-lose " principle. The Bill is, therefore, a scandalous outrage on the democratic idea of equality of rights, and condemns the Government as only too ready to trample upon the public welfare. The Labour Party will know what to do with it, and if it decides to hold up Parliamentary business with every means at its disposal—even if this means an indefinite postponement of Mr. Massey's departure for the Imperial Conference —it will have every justification. The time has surely passed when the people will permit the enactment of a Bill to entrench a Government "bent on serving the profiteers, the banks and insurance companies, land monopolists and boodlers, and there will be plenty of support for every kind of resistance to this contemptible trickery. The Labour Party is quite clear on the question of electoral change. It wants proportional representation fairly administered over the whole country, but if this is refused it prefers the ;nrst-past-the-post, which in some degree counteracts its own injustice, and therefore is better than other systems which in reality only load the dice. So Mr. Massey may look out for trouble. O « « * Trades Union Tactics • The reception accorded Messrs. Bevin and Gosling t>y striking dockers in London during the week raises a difficult problem in Trade Union tactics. The question to be decided is whether Trade Unionism shall act as a disciplined foiye, taking a long view of policy and its effects, or as a crowd guided solely by the impulse of the moment. The latter course is the heroic one, and when men will fight it goes decidedly against the grain to'discourage them; but The Maoriland Worker is convinced that it is a menace to the.real interests of T>rade Unionism, and, in the existing circumstances, a dangerous miscalculation of its powers. In. the present case, the facts seem to be that an agreement vras entered into which provided for a reduction of wages after the lapse, of a certain period—which agreement, if we remember .rightly, was a great improvement oil what the employers originally proposed yet when its operation fell due, the men declined to honour it, and struck against the advice of their officials. It is certainly not a crime to disagree with officials, but that is not the point; the point is whether it is advisable to violate agreements when, this involves, possibly, a weakening of the strength of Unionism, a loss of agreements altogether, and consequently a serious retrogression in wages and conditions. Our view is that it is not advisable, and that to recognise agreements is, in actual result, the more militant policy of the two, seeing that the stability and solidarity of Unionism is the only means by which industrial progress can be made at all. The upsnot or the present movement in London will be a refusal by the employers to recognise the unofficial movement, a resumption of work under compulsion of starvation, and, in all probability, the dictation of conditions worse than those in the agreement.- And when the agreement would have ordinarily terminated the Union will have lost the power even to take advantage of a more favourable economic situation.' The Australian miners have of recent months had to face a similar problem, and experience has forced them to place a barm on unofficial strikes, which from every point of view are rnihoiis to organisation. If we are 1o have strikes, let them be the act of a disciplined body,-and let them aim at objects that are commensurate with the sacrifice and. the rjsjk