PREVENTION

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10685, 3 September 1920, Page 4

PREVENTION

" The announcement of yesterday that the registration of the foreign clement on the wharves will-be. revived with compulsory effect is satisfactory. It is evidence of a determination to leave no stone unturned in tho work of curbing the. disturbing elements. It has been, objected* .since,..we. made .the suggestion to revive this registration, that the disturbing clement on the Wellington wharves is not a foreign element. But as tlio Wellington wharf lis not the only wharf in the Dominion, and ac it is not alone in its liability to disturbs nee, the objection is by no means conclusive. .Moreover, as we said the. other day, registration will be no hardship whatever to the foreigner "who plays the game: It will; on the contrary, be to his advantage, for it will draw special attention to his good behaviour. The foreigner, therefore, who plays the game cannot have any Kenso of injury, and must bo consequently without any grievance. He should, as a matter .of fact, bo grateful to a policy which protects him against an undoubtedly dangerous element. If that element is how absent from the Wellington wharf,. the revival of tho registration will keep it absent. There is, however, a- disturbing element on the Wellington wharf, and if it is not foreign, what, is it? That question must be faced and settled. For that purpose it would be well to add a regulation, for special treatment of that element. Such a regulation, if we may judge by recent events, would have the support of the majority of the workers, who object strongly to tho breach of 'thoir own rules and tho disregard for agreements of their own making. In the interests of the peace which all rightthinking people desire, the point should be oarefully examined before tho necessary protective legislation is put into final shape. The protection required, it must be remembered, is against foreign ideas, irrespective of tho men who put them into practice.