THE SHAG POINT COLLIERY STRIKE.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 6 July 1880, Page 2

THE SHAG POINT COLLIERY STRIKE.

(from our own correspondent, ) Palmerston, July 6. A public meeting was held last night, his Worship the Mayor presiding, regarding a coal supply for the town. Only forty persons were present. The meeting, as far as regards a test of public feeling, was a perfect farce, only some six persons voting either way. Some resolutions were carried, but such can only be looked upon as the opinions of two or three persons, and not the opinion of the public. The pi'igin of the meeting was to force Mr. Elliot, lessee of the coal reserve adjoining the Shag Point Company to either work the lease or abandon it. But the song of the few speakers was nothing ipore than a tirade against the latter Company. A petitjqn wag to be drawn up for presentation to the Qor vernment, but only some eight persons present could be induced to have anything to do with it. Some of the gentlemen proposed on the Committee to draw up the petition, in objecting to their names being used, appeared to throw |a damper on the affair, and the meeting was abruptly broken up. As showing the onesidedness of the meeting, one speaker remarked that he did not suppose any person would aefc on the Committee who was under the influence of the Shag point Company, forgetting that he (the speaker) was simply a puppet in the hands of another, and was l'ed into opposition to the Company by the influence of the aforesaid another, and the above remark was, to say the least, in bad taste, especially coming from 'the quarter it did. The other principal speaker on this occasion (indeed on all occasions) is one who has on every occasion ran yelping at the heels of the Company. The name of the Shag Point Company, to the individual Tnpntionpd, js something similar to presenting a red rag tp a \vijd btjll, and the gapie result is always attained. The Company and the bull go on their way rejoicing notwithstanding. The whole meeting was simply a case of poking your ' nose into another man's affairs with whom they had no business.