BACK TO WORK

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXX, 15 June 1936, Page 5

BACK TO WORK

STRIKERS IN FRANCE SITUATION GREATLY IMPROVED VICTORY DEMONSTRATIONS IN PARIS (United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) (Received 15th June. 9.15 a.m.) PARIS, 14th June. The situation has greatly improved, and strikers everywhere are returning to work. With the metal workers dispute settled, it is generally hoped that the back of the strike is broken. Employees of the firms of Citroen and Renault formally evacuated the factories. The Renault employees, dressed in carnival costumes, held a procession with flower-laden taxis and cabs, celebrating the victory. There wore similar demonstrations in many suburbs. Work generally will be resumed on Monday, although builders, painters, Parisian stores assistants, insurance clerks, and riVer and canal boatmen are still standing out. Paris dockers came out, joining the boatmen. . Twelve hundred employees of the Nieuport aeroplane works have begun a “stay in.” The stoppage movement has spread to Morocco, where native sugar refiners and metal workers struck.

SIGNIFICANT DEVELOPMENT MOBILE GUARDS OCCUPY TOWN HALLS DETERMINATION TO PRESERVE ORDER PARIS, 12th June. The most important individual settlement was the signature of a collective contract at the Ministry of the Interior by the employers and employees of the metallurgical industry. A significant development was the occupation of all the Paris town halls by armed mobile guards who, however, are gendarmerie, and not soldiers. This action resulted from a conference between M. Blum, M. Salengro Minister of the Interior, and the Police Prefect, M. La Geron, which determined upon the preservation of order at all costs. M. Blum declared that deputies and the Government are determined to enforce public order in view of the impression that suspicious external influences are operating, resulting in increased nervousness and a tendency to panic. Every strategic point in the city has been occupied, demonstrating the Government's anxiety to prevent rioting, buglers and mobile guards being on duty at the Montmarte-Drouot cross-roads ready to sound the firing alarm, namely, three warning blasts. Neglect of this warning by the crowds will produce a final blast, after which the guards are legally entitled to fire. Similar tense conditions prevail in all the great industrial areas. Many members of the Croix de Feu perambulated the streets on a pretence of preserving order, but police refused their aid and arrested many of their number. The Bourse is steady, but the franc has depreciated from 76.28 to 76.39.

UPROAR IN CHAMBER When the Chamber of Deputies met, Rightists began obstructing in order to prevent a discussion on the new Government’s Bills, but a show of hands rejected a motion to shelve them on the pretext that the factories are still occupied and that law and order are not respected. Uproar, punctuated with cries of “pigs” and “scoundrels” greeted M. Blums’ introduction of the measures. Another wild demonstration was precipitated by his declaration that he would not order police and mobile guards to enter occupied factories. The measure exempting ex-service-men’s pensions from taxation was passed without division, and the Paid Holidays Bill, granting 15 days’ leave after a year’s service, was passed by 563 votes to 1. After a monotonous debate the Chamber eventually passed the Restoration of Cuts Bill, which, incidentally, precludes civil servants taking jobs outside State employment, and adopted the Collective Contracts Bill by 528 votes to 7.

! MORE STRIKERS RESUME The Municipal Council has resolved to ’ decline all responsibility for' any damage by strikes, the illegality of which the Government has recognised but has not attempted to condemn. The Ministry of Labour announced the termination of the strikes in the cabinet-making, butchering, dressmaking, slop clothing, and leather bag and trunk trades, while the metallurgical workers, builders, carpenters, and locksmiths are expected to resume work on 15th June. At Amiens the undertakers’ employees have struck, rendering funeral impossible. Lunatic asylum warders struck and left the director single-handed. The inmates of a factory deliberately set fire to it, but the flames were extipguished by firemen.

A STRANGE VISION NEW FRANCE IN THE MAKING (Received 15th June, 12.45 p.m.) LONDON, 14th June. The “Manchester Guardian’s” Paris correspondent says there was a strange vision of a new France in the making when the names of twentytwo victims of Fascism killed in street fights in the past two years were read out at a drum-tapped Requiem. After each name, the band finally playing the Russian funeral march, speakers delivered addresses triumphantly recording the result of the strikes and prophesying a more prosperous future for workers. VICTORY FESTIVAL ORGANISED *BY COMMUNISTS HUNDRED THOUSAND PRESENT LONDON, 14th June. The “Daily Mail’s” Paris correspondent says that marking the termination of the majority of the strikes hundreds of thousands of employees who are resuming to-morrow marched in orderly files from the workshops. Bodies of men afterwards returned to

many of the factories and spent hours in removing revolutionary mural drawings and notices. The “Manchester Guardian’s” Paris correspondent says that while racegoers representing half Paris went to Chantilly to see the French Derby, the other half spent the afternoon in a victory festival, organised by the Communist Party at Velodrome, Buffalo, a vast open-air stadium in the working class suburb of Montrouge. Everything was well organised with flags and banners on a colossal scale. A hundred thousand people crowded the grandstands and a 100,000 stood in the sunny arena, which was bisected by a raised gangway leading to the speakers’ forum. Tricolours alternated with red flags. Banners inscribed “A Free, Strong and Happy France” floated from each end of the stadium. Everyone wore red emblems and a huge picture of the late Henri Barbousse adorned the speakers’ platform. The band played revolutionary tunes, while squads of victorious strikers bearing banners displaying the hammer and sickle badges paraded the gangway. As the crowds cheered for the Soviet’s, suddenly four great flags were broken from flagpoles in the middle of the arena. These were examples of the newly devised national flag of Soviet France, namely, a red field quartered with the tricolour and the communist hammer and sickle between the golden letters R.F. on the fly.

GRAVE IN BELGIUM STRIKE FEVER SPREADING THE KING INTERVENES BRUSSELS, 13th June. The strike fever is spreading. The Government mobilised the reserve corps of gendarmes to prevent occupation of factories. The strike situation is so grave that the King urgently summoned M. Van Zeeland to the Palace again and asked him to try to form a Government. M. Van Zeeland promised to do his utmost to have a Government by to-day which would “face the situation fearlessly.” The King personally appealed to Catholic, Socialist, and Liberal leaders to support M. Van Zeeland. Troops have' taken over police duties at Antwerp, where 15,000 dockers and 2,000 diamond cutters are on strike. The coal strike at Liege spread to the large fields around Mons. GENERAL STRIKE OF MINERS ANNOUNCED (Received 15th June, 9.15 a.m.) BRUSSELS, 14th June. After a fruitless conference at which coalowners rejected the miner’s demand for a 10 per cent, increase in pay, the miners announced that a general strike will begin on 15th June. HOLD-UP AT ANTWERP (Received 15th June, 9.15 a.m.) ANTWERP, 14th June. Tug hands joined the striking dockers and refuse to assist cargo vessels to leave port. NEW CABINET FORMED SOCIALISTS, LIBERALS AND CATHOLICS

PROGRAMME OUTLINED (Received 15th June, 9.15 a.m.) BRUSSELS, 14th June. M. Van Zeeland, the former Prime Minister, has formed a cabinet consisting of six Socialists, three Liberals, and five Catholics. The cabinet includes the Socialist leader M. Va n d erve lA s as Vice-Pre-sident of the Council. The programme, which will be selected from the best of each party’s programme in the recent election, aims at simplification of legislation and finance, completion of economic reconstruction, cleaning up of politics, and control of munition works and monopolies, such as electricity. •It will consider the demand for a fortyhour week, especially in dangerous and unhealthy trades; but M. Van. Zeeland urges that it should not generally be adopted until other industrial nations are internationally agreed on it.

GUARD DECAPITATED FATAL AFFRAYS (United Press Association— By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) MADRID, 13th June. Three civil guards were passing Socialist headquarters in the village of Palenciana when the inmates rushed out, attacked them and dragged one named Manuel Jiminez into the building where he was maltreated and finally decapitated. The other guards unavailingly attempted to force an entrance, exchanging shots and wounding several. Two were sent to hospital. Police reinforcements arrived and arrested 22 including the mayor and deputymayor, but the assailant who actually beheaded Jiminez escaped. Two Syndicalists were shot dead at Malaga in the course of Syndicalist and Communist rioting. Socialists and Communists have mostly returned to work, but Syndicalists are still idle and maintain a violent attitude. Later a chief of police was shot dead and two children were accidentally shot dead. The death roll in three days was 12. No newspapers have been issued for five days. Shock police convey Gibraltar mails to Lalinea in armoured cars. Four persons were killed in shooting affrays between Fascists and Communists at Burgos and at Valladolid. A Fascist and a Communist were killed in a gun battle at Gumiel, and two persons were fatally knifed in Olmedo.