UNION WITH ALLIANCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18079, 2 May 1922, Page 6

UNION WITH ALLIANCE

THE P. AND T. BALLOT.

SPEECH BY SECRETARY.

GOVERNMENT CRITICISED.

WELLINGTON. Moaday.

A speech made by Air. H. E. Combs, secretary of the Pc«t and Telegraph Officers' Association, at a Labour gathering in Wellington last night, presumably reflects the view taken by the executive o* the association. He said the members of the organisation were passing through a very anxious time and they felt in the crisis that had fallen uoon their shoulders that they would like to have the sympathy and moral support of the rest of the community. They could appreciate, he thought, quite as fully asi he could, what lay ahead. There was a direct effort to suppress the movement of members of the association toward a larger outlook. That movement had taken most definite shape as far as the Post and Telegraph Association was concerned, and in the most definite way the authorities had said that the movement had to stop. 'The Post and Telegraph service, through himself that evening, asked those present at the meeting to tell them to go ahead.

As far as their particular trouble or grievance was concerned at the present time he was not free to make anything more than the general statement he had made because the decision did not rest in his hands, bat would rest in the hands of those who would assemble toward the close of the present week. Mr. Combs remarked that he could say quite definitely as far as the service was concerned, and by that he meant the majority of the members, that they resented the attitude of victimisation and intimidation held over their heads if they proceeded with the cause to which they had placed their hands. He added that if theirs was something wrong with the present social system what was wrong with making a change in the system? The machinery of the Government at the present time had passed out of the hagds of the people into the hands of a fcroup. That group was controlling the machinery. The working class comprised 90 per cent, of the whole of the community and was entitled to 90 per cent, of the representation in Parliament.