SHEARERS' ACCOMMODATION.

NZ Truth, Issue 168, 5 September 1908, Page 4

SHEARERS' ACCOMMODATION.

The horror that has overcome the wool kings of Canterbury at the introduction by ' the Government of, a Bill providing for the humane ascammodatioh and treatment of shearers is too brutal for words, and it has been left to Charlie Lewis/ Fat's obedient small dog m the House; of Reps., to explode with violence m the Christchurch Tory "Press:" 'i'he futile, little person's diatri.be boils down to very small dimensions, shorn of its wordy ornamentation and trimmings, and may be briefed thusly :—

(1) The farming community has awakened at last. - I (2) Who asked for' the Bill ? Clearly not the sheep-owners. Was it the shearers ? That is at least uinlikely.

(3) Sheep-owners have altered shears ers' whares to conform to the existing law.

(4) Eolations between employer and employed were never m a more delica,tc or critical condition, why incense the employers, who have just concluded .a most "disastrous year ? , (5) There is no security for employers. •'■-.. ' . ; ' . . . ; -'- ;

, (C). Accommodation of railway men^ co-operative workers, and m tifc workers' homes is inferior to that sought to 'be obtained for shearers by the Bill. (7) I— (Lewis is a sheep person)— l think mdre of good food for ray shearers than of accommodation.

This sleepless . newspaper is pleased to hear that the farmers have awakened ; probably they will r v see that their dogs and racehorses are better .liousea than the human beings to whose labor is due the farmer's capacity to live without work. Clearly it was not the duty of the Government to go to the grinding, sweating shecp-c and ask permission for the introduction of the «'..carers' Accommodation Bill, and lor Charlie Lewis to suggest that he thought the wool-kings might m their wildest dreams ask for such a measure is a hilarious circumstance of 300 horse power. It seems unlikely 'to Lewis that the shearers should ask for it, biut what docs it matter who asked for it so lonp; as decent accommodation is required ? The lact that the wool kings have altered their wretched hovels to bring them into conformity with the requirements of the existing; law merely shows that they complied with that law under threat of , prosecution ; but if it is found that the existing law doesn't provide for a sufficiently commodious and adequately equipped building, there is nothing to prevent the law being changed, and the sheep-Owners who build palatial mansions for themselves and furnish them luxuriously will lind plenty of money to make their .workmen comfortable, even to a medicine chest and a fire m each bedroom. The man who makes Fat's fortune is entitled to some consideration. , Of course, relations between employer and employed arc m a delicate and 'critical condition. When the employed finds the boss pouching all the profits, while he, the profit maker, isn't even supplied with suitable accommodation, his uneasiness under the imposition is calculated to make relations with the monopolist delicate, and critical ; and the

fact that the sheep-farmers have just conclude;! a most disastrous year is : to be regretted. They certainly don't show it. They put up at Warner's, as usual, and give • Irish prices for bloodstock, and import the best thing m motor cars, and bedeck the missus and daughters m expensive fabrics, and live as luxuriously as of yore. And when they owe all 'these things to the degraded working person who is agitating for better accdmmodationj policy ought to counsel agreement with the Bill. The expenditure .on the miserable whares oiught to be made even at the expense of the trip to Hanmer, or Rotorua, or Hingland, which every purebred (or otherwise), long-wocllcd person considers is due to his social position to make periodically. And, of course, there is no security for employers, so long as they persist m robbing their employees of their just dues. Only, it. is indiscreet to talk about the insecurity, on the principle that' when your opponent knows you are alarmed he redoubles his efforts to plant an unclean left on your countenance. The accommodation of railway employees, cooperativ^ workers and other Government employees may not be too good, but that is noj' reason why the accommodation of shearers shoiuld be bad. If Lewis objects to ihe bad accommodation ;of Government servants, he should howl for an improvement m their condition ; and Lewis has never yelled for any such thing ; as a representative of Fat he has continuously and insistently opposed any expenditure of public money .that would, be likely to improve the accommodation or the general lot of the worker, m the Government employ. Alsd v the. f,acfc .that Lewis gives liis shearers good food, inciudittg "vegetables," to uso his own wo¥ds, is not a thing .to brag aiSout ; it ' .is merely his duty, seeing that Lewis owes his affluence to his shearers and other workers. Why shouldu't they have vegetables ? Lewis^has plenty' of vegetables, and why should the circumstance that /he gives his shearers good food (we have only bis own word: for it) relieve him of the responsibility of "furnishing them with reasonable accommodation, even to a bathroom ?. Why shouldn't a shearer have a bath occasionally ? The glacinl cheek of these sheep-farmers, \yho sit around lazily watchmg other people toiling for them, and actually object to reasonable accommodation, for their slaves, is held up for general inspectfion herewith. One is almost tempted to, ask, is the sheep proprietor necessary at The sheep industry woUM exist without him, but would pass m its marble, so to speak, with the resignation of the shearer aha th© musterer and the packer and the slaughterer.- > \