AS OTHERS SEE US

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LVI, 19 May 1923, Page 7

AS OTHERS SEE US

NEW ZEALAND "TORY CDRSED" WHAT OF, QUEENSLAND? Early this year New Zealand was visited by Mr J. S. Codings, the Queensland Labour organiser, \vho addressed meeting throughout the Dominion. On his return the Daily Standard, a Labour newspaper, published an article under the headings: "Tory Cursed Land," "Impressions of Maoriland," which a New Zealand resident in Brisbane has forwarded to the New Zealand Times. "FILTHY AND DEGRADING" Mr Collings, in the course of his interview, is reported to have said that in" New Zealand "Many toilers with little to make life really worth while seem afraid to call their souls their own *«.".■•, . . . 1 wish my mates ot the railway shops of Queensland could know the conditions over there. The shops, the yard, the sanitary conveniences arc indescribably filthy and degrading " After reading the article the New Zealander, "Rimu," wrote as follows: — SAD STATE OF AFFAIRS! "As an old New Zealander who has recently visited the Domjinion I had the idea from my convictions that the people of the Dominion considered themselves a cut above the ordinary Australian. As certain of your own poets and statesmen also have said, your land is "God's own country." " 'Comrade' Jesse Silver Collings, the Queensland State Labour organiser, has just returned from a tour in the Dominion. In an interview published in the Daily Standard (Labour) newspaper, a copy of which is attaciied, he reveals a sad state of affairs. "If his -story can be believed the 'comrades' in Maoriland are a shockingly down-trodden and servile lot. "The gospel sounded by St. Jesse on his silver trumpet must .indeed have been a message of hope and deliverance to them. The picture he. draws of the glistening eyes of the civil servants and the groans of" the railway employees in their uncongenial and insanitary conditions is indeed pathetic, and no doubt fired the elequence. and imagination of the apostle of emancipation. "One's heart bleeds to think of the injustice and cruelty of the 'masters.' St. Jesse, however, does not explain if he means the employers or the union secretaries, whoso consent must bo sought that the poor worker may call his soul his own. "No wonder New Zealand workers subjected to the above .conditions 'would gladly suffer martyrdom' to possess what their Australian comrades so carelessly enjoy. THE OTHER SIDE "Did Comrade Jesse tell New Zealand audiences the following facts:—"At the last census there were 33,348 unemployed in tho State of Queensland? For the year ended June 20th, 1922, £177,000 was tho cost, of free rations for unemployed and 'won't . works' in the State of Queensland? "Did he tell them of the discontent among the civil servants and railway employees in tho State of Queensland ? "That in Queensland, as in other lands, the union oxecutive is tho 'master', without whoso consent a worker cannot call his soul his own?"