BENIGN BEN.

NZ Truth, Issue 133, 17 August 1907, Page 7

BENIGN BEN.

HIS TALE OF TOIL,

Waterside Worker's Woes.

THE DIRGE ®F THE DOCKER.

Probably there is not another man | In Australia who knows so much a- ' bout the- sufferings of the London dock laborer, or, as we should call him here, the waterside worker, as Ben Tillett, the man to wfaom is due whatever credit is apportionable for the settlement of the dispute between the Sydney coal-lumpers and the owners of the collaries. Day after day. ! before the formation of the Dock Laborers' Union, Hen Tillett stood at ..London dock gates urging the formamtion of the Union, and. at last, the Ifday came when the 'dockers heard him Ijpt'h approval, formed their union, '^l-rwl successfully struck. Tillett is Jpw m Australia; but before leav-Jnn-g the old country h-e drew with f his pen for '•Just-ice" a graphic and pathetic picture of the sufferings and privations of the London dockers. It thus appears m "Justice" of June 22 :— "THE DOCKER. "The docker stands about the best of chances for reaping the harvest of diseases. All the poisonous and dangerous commodities have to pass through his hands m- one way or another."' Let it be deadly dynamite, . poisonous chemicals, dangerous and foul materials, he must needs slave and strain at the harness of hard work. He meets with pitch poison, producing painful cancers, his eyesigfojj is destroyed, liis skin is.burnt, lids face charred with burnings and the fine dust eating into his flesh. He is choked m a black hole blacker than the "Mack bolo of Calcutta," and does it daily for a living, with . odds on death chances all the time. If he works ores, t'.ic preparation m centre of ..shipment reduced the mineral to a palpable dust, CAUSING A BLEEDING af. the nose,, loss or impairment of ' ayc-sii^ht, the clothes ' are burnt off his 'back, his skin is ripped with the • biting acids, and he vomits blood from the foulness of his occupation. Guanos, nitres, sulphurs, eat up the fine tissue of lung, and throat, and skin alike. I have referred to grain cargoes and the Chicago-like -danger, of them, as foods to tibe people : but to somo of these acids are added to make the occupation still more irksome and dangerous. "With slippery ropes, wet chains,'

decks, hatches, tables, platforms, th) dangerous conditions of working make- safety a mere accident. Swinging setts, clumsy wmchmen, defective machinery m driving, add their quota to the element ot risk. "Hatchways are becoming larger as ships get bigger, and holds are multiplied as well as decks., together with the increase m the processes of discharging and loading ; ; the facilities offer more chances of accident I am gttad to know, however, that the " DANGER IS BEING FACED by the edict of the Home. Office and Board of Trade. "The ladders to holds are now constructed so as to afford access through mairiholes m the deck. . taking one man down a hold at a time, which suggestion the dockers' unions forced as a result of a Government inquiry. The ladder being fore and aft the ship, is well protected by the stout stanchion, whio'h protects the swinging sett or bale from knocking against the rungs of tbe ladder. "A 45 or 50 foot drop into ahold is quite possible now, and the heavier gearing'' to accommodate the greater weights hoisted onlv-adds sureness to death risks, m case of -accident.- There is greater danger, toeoause the lifting power of the machinery is necessary to Hft . op x jerk out- the tightly stowed and heavy parcels, which could not be moved by hand, or body weight, or shifted by ordinary leverage.. That means a ' GREATER PHYSICAL STRAIN upon the men who handle the ever increasing, weight of working gear. There is always the driving, bullying ganger ; speed and despatch must go on 171 spite of risks, and it is death take the foremost, with little chance of serious 'inquiry into the cause of death. Witnesses- are intimidated by the fear of (hunger and unemployment, so life itself is made to pay the penalty of danger and despatch. . •'Dangers could be considerably minimised with a proper complement of men m each gang employed, but disorganisation lends aid to all' impositions, however harsh. The fates could not possibly have chosen a worse punishment, for men than to give them . •employment as dockers. 1 The best of products pass : m tons through their -hands, by the thousand

tons even, while they may be wanting a bare wherewithal of life. The worker is generally a lusty fellow and young, whose sturdy frame and fresh face catoh the watchful eye of the 'taker on' iji some dock stoed,*, perched m a kind of 'Punch and Judy' box, from which elevatiion he scans the crowd, and ignores without compunction any hungry, weak,,, or old face c Tkese 'drudges'- are cattle to be HIRED BY PLUMPNESS, . youth and weight. It is his business,, and Mr 'Taker-on' is used to the sight of starving, anxious faces ;\ he is. deaf to the cry ' of desperation, and is amused at the frenzied tragedy of men fighting each other m sheer despair and hunger, for a chance of an odd hour of labor. Supercilious statesmen, .vicious Pharisees of 1 philanthropists, all the canting crew of moral reformers, thrift advocates, temperance faddists and the ragtag of hypocritical religionists, should witness the" sight ; the God of it, the humanity of it all. Nay, the criminality of it, is so app/alling, it is ao. wonder a crowd who might do useful v/ork as trades unionists prefer to be the free lanoe and the professional politician.- Your young fellow is taken, on ; hois young, strong; his heart is young, too ; his spirits are high. He roughs it against the more experienced of his labor competitors, but lie elbows out another of less efficiency, finds the struggle to maintain his position' increases as his strength and chances diminish. An accident, and at 25 he has jumped the span of his efficiency, and is 70 m strength by one blow, fall, or . CRUSH OF FALLING CARGO. "•He is patched up, takes a job, becoming increasingly infrequent, drops his pride, takes' gutter philanthropy, beer or coffee, bread or cheese, waits for his more fortunate mates, sinks to cadging, forgets to go home early, his habits are vicious, for be is hunted : home ties, love of wife, of children, of friend, partake of another .character, for the sordid has eaten; into the soul of him. The law of selfpreservation, the damnable part of degeneration, turns from man to brute, and all the primitive savage comes on top, to the degradation and ruin of himself and dependents, for he mixes with the legion of the damned. . . ' 'The home 'goes a bit at the time, with the mother-wife straining and dying toy bits, too. The lav/ of motherhood makes its heroic fight against odds so brutal, with anguish so distressing, that heart . and body are destro3 r ed IN THE FIERCE FIGHT of it. Her man has lost courage, has lost strength, character, hope, sometimes he never recovers at all, even with the angel fighting ' for his soul as she docs for the lives of her children. But the same hum an tragedy is being enacted a thousand times over uoi-t-iJ the streets, the doss-house, the" gaol, or grave, claim the victims of precarious' employment and inhuman unconcern. "Besides the ordinary dangers and difficulties when fortunate enough to obtain work, the docker is exposed to all weathers. He is kept waiting m cold or wot, in 'hunger, m rags, night and day, expectantly anxious., until hunger and wet have done their fell work and pulmonary troubles complete the disaster and END OF HTS BEING. •'This example is the normal ctaction of 60 per cent, of those looking for work at the docks. To add to the woes of the man, -driven to work at the gates, is the "recommended" man. Often a 'dead heat" from another trade, or someone "come down m life," a poor derelict clerk, whose experience, and unfit-ness calls out all the sardonic and bitter humor that suffering so piteously exposes itself to. The very vagaries' of the seasons of all the earth, the cornerings of markets*, of commodities, of money ; brutal lusts pf greed ; lusts that look only like vulture's for the sick, weak, and worthy, these are vicious and merciless factors, insidiously working murder m all homes. "Prosperity comes' to those who live on rapine, disease and famine ; the poor wretches made poor by the very «fuality and worth of their labor, and rewarded m inverse ratio to their value, peter out wretchedi existences, m all the TERRORS AND AGONY heroic natures make, m fighting' against implacable sordidness. "The conditions applying to London also exist m every large port. The same set of conditions, the same weary waits, fthe same using up of young life, the same tragedy of home life, the same vomitings to the streets of a stream of womanhood and manhood that might have been parents of giants of intellects . and bodies alike. Byron said of these and their like :<~ "And thus they piod m sluggish misery, » Rotting "from sire to son, and age to age, Proud of theii trampled nature, and so die, Becyueathiing their hereditary rage To the new race of -inborn 'slaves, who wage War for their chains, and rather than be free',Bleed gladiator like, and still engage, Within the same arena, where they see ' : Their fellows fall before, liKe leaves of the same tree." Good luck.— Sincerely, BEN TILLETT.