FREE SPEECH

New Zealand Times, Volume L, Issue 11660, 26 October 1923, Page 5

FREE SPEECH

TO BE ALLOWED TO EMPLOYERS

MR T. W. YOUNG EXPLAINS.

At the meeting of the Conciliation Council yesterday, in regard to the seamen’s dispute, Mr W. T. Young (secretary to the Federated Seamen's Union) stated that he had been reported in the three Wellington papers as having said at tho previous day’s silting that when the Labour Party came into power the employers would be deprived of the right of free speech. “I don’t know whether that impression was convoyed to tho representatives of the Press/’ said Mr Young; ‘‘but I wish to say that such a statement from me, if made seriously, would be exceedingly foolbih on my part. The Labour movement does not propose to deprive anyone of the freedom of sj>eecli. On the contrary, when Labour comes into power, the whole community, including the employers, will have more freedom of Kpo<-< h than they possess now. So far as tho Lai.our movement in concerned, it wauls the employers tn say more in the future than they have said in the pa**t.” The Comniirvdoner (Mr Newton) remarkM later that he understood that Mr Young's remark the day tcfuic had been *>i a jocular character*