A SIGH OF RELIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20902, 18 June 1931, Page 12

A SIGH OF RELIEF.

WATERFRONT ATMOSPHERI.

SHADOW OF DARK CLOUD.

PASSING OF CRITICAL HOURS,

A sigh of relief went through the city when the news of a settlement of the cooks and stewards' dispute was circulated. ."I know these men and I know their attitude of mind," said a seafarer: of former days, "and I am certain that the average member of the union did not want to strike. Many <yf them told But they knew that they must go out if the headquarters so decided, and they knew that in that event they would not probably regain their jobs when the trouble was over."

Before the news came through there was a feeling of grave foreboding about the waterfront. Queen's Wharf was busy. The Rotorua, deep-laden for England, was ready to sail, and the passengers were holding the coloured streamers to prolong the last tie. The Ruahine was discharging. All seemed normal, but there was an undercurrent of unrest because of the farreaching effects of a maritime strike.

Down on the Central Wharf there was no shipping traffic, but workmen were busy in erecting tho barriers in preparation for the Winter Exhibition. But who could contemplate calmly the possibility of tho exhibition occurring during a striko that would have so aggravated the depression ? The Mosquito Fleet. Several vessels lay at the Northern Wharf, some loaded, others loading or coaling. On ono of the loaded ones the crew sat on a hatch-cover in discourse as to what tho next few hours would bring. Appearances were normal about the vessels which were loading. Tanks and concrete pipes, oil. and petrol, beer and baths, sugar and flour, were being handled—and one wondered if the country storekeepers and the farmers to whom the goods were consigned would receive them.

There was no activity on the Maui Pomare and dt was not difficult to picture that; ill-starred ship lying in the same condition at the same berth for some time, as idle as the four high-riding steamers lying out of commission off Hobson Bay. The sight of those four idle steamers seemed to' be an eloquent argument against the strike. There they lay because they could not get cargo. They meant the unemployment of many men. What if the ships that could get cargo were to be forcibly thrown out of commission because a small section of the crews was ordered asliore as a protest against a wage roductjon which the depression has made inevitable, the same depression that sent useful steamers to moorings. The Menace of Misery. There was not a..man about the waterfront—master mariners, cargo-workers, lorry-drivers and merchants' clerks —who did not feel the influence of the cloud that hung over .this centre of industry. Whatever: lip-serviqe that-might have i been paid to the case of the cooks and stewards, whatever recklessness that, .might, have been expressed, there was not. q. man who did not realise that a maritime strike would add unnecessary misery to, .what exists and bring personal privation to many then in jobs. Few- in their heart of hearts did not feel glad at the lifting of the cloud.