NOTES AND COMMENTS ON LABOUR QUESTIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13647, 15 January 1908, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS ON LABOUR QUESTIONS.

';'.:'; •;'" ' BY ARTISAN. Keiq' Haiiuie is to be back in Australia nest -week. ...•-.,. The street-hawking controversy is causing nmcl). discussion in Labour ranks. The Maritime Clerks'' Union is now affiliated with the Sydney Labour Council. Some difficulty is experienced in securing farm'and.dairy hands in the-Taranaki district just now. There are likely to be some changes in commotion with the Auckland Worker Newspaper Company. , A^, c the commencement of 1907 the wagoeartiers employed in Australian factories numbered 228,715: The master bricklayers of Sydney have agreed to pay union hod-carriers while serving bricklayers 93 a day. The Auckland shop assistants are considering the prospects of a union on the sarao lines as exist in New South Wales. The weather conditions continuing favourable, a good deal of active employment is going on amongst outdoor trades. The date of aithe Queensland elections is February 2. The Labour party of that State aro conducting a vigorous campaign. : Inquiries in Labour circles show that work is plentiful, and the various .unions show a marked increase in' membership and funds. Miss Powell, organiser for the Independent, Political Labour League, proposes giving an address on a Sunday afternoon, in tho' near 'future.. Matters political in'the ranks of Labour ari? proceeding steadily, and there is an air of -quiet- determination to consolidate for the next general election. The New Zealand branch of tho Seamen's Union has approached the local shipping companies for improved conditions of employment and better wages. The backwash of the American money panic is affecting Canada, with the result that, factories are being closed and thousands of workmen thrown idle. A couple of meetings have been held by dressers, boilermakers, '■ and foundry labourers, for the purpose of organising' all ironworkers. A final meeting takes place on Saturday next to bring; about the unity of the above workers. The Carters' Union at their recent annual meeting elected a strong committee of eight out of 12 nominations. The secretary stated that the financial membership had increased by 37 and tho funds by £52, as compared with the previous year.

Miss Goldstein, lecturing in Melbourne recently, stated that there were 145,000 women , in. Victoria earning their own living. This was hold as a menace to the employment of men, but the speaker held that the fault lay with the men themselves.

The proposition at the recent conference in Christehureh to extend the power of the Arbitration Court to fix rent, interest, and profit • was lost. The mover stated that the change was needed to fix the balance between the disproportion of the increase in wages during the last ten years and the increase of food and rent.

Novelist. Jerome K. Jerome writes in. the Loudon Daily Mail: —" Look .at the hopeless case of the average labouring class. They love and marry, and then face the certainty of the uncertainty of existence. Their whole chance of living depends upon the goodwill and fortune of someone else, and they never know when they arc going to bo out of the employment'which is necessary for the keeping up of the home. One-quarter of those who inevitably come into unemployment drift down to the dregs, and are of the class of those nightly found in the slums. It is a hopeless outlook for their old age. How can a man save anything on an average wage of 255? There "is nothing you can do for him. What is the good of charity? It only goes back into the rich people's pockets. Round about my home no labouring man can live on his wages, and everyone helps him to live, -•• that the farmer gets him at a price be would not otherwise be able to obtain him for. If I give a loaf„to a man I give it to his employer. He'is only a casual labourer, and never works full time; is often hard up, and dependent upon the help of friends. It is a ghastly situation. Charity is given not to the poor but to the rich. " It is like giving a half-penny to the organ-grinder's monkey. I claim that the whole personal existence of civilisation is a wholesale scheme of robbery. Everybody is robbing everybody else. You can see it in the advertisements of goods for _..e. An honest tradesmen could not keep his shop open for a week. The whole system of. civilisation, from the very foundation, is rotten to the core. The competitive system in vogue we got from the jungle, and ought to have been left behind .; when wo loft our tails there. It was all right with the cave men, but the moment- one cave man shook hands with another it went to the -wail."