EMPHASIS ON PRECEPT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25881, 27 June 1945, Page 4

EMPHASIS ON PRECEPT

In the course of a tour which appears to be embracing the country/ the Minister of Works, Mr Semple, has been pursuing a favourite theme. “ Scroungers ” and “ malingerers ” have never received his praise; and be it said that he has never deferred, to the same extent as have other members of the inept Government to which he belongs, to unionism rampant. His theme, as expounded recently in .various statements made during his tour, is a simple and true one. Men must work to live; “ the only real wealth is that which is created from the country’s resources by the sweat and honest toil of its people.” He has inveighed, moreover, in blunt and effective language, against “ those who weakened their own and their fellows’ claim to better treatment by their irresponsible demands and actions ” —who are, as he said at Auckland, “ prepared to loaf and scrounge their way through life at the expense of their mates’ efforts.” All this is very well said, as is Mr Semple’s reminded that the “ scrounger ” and the “ malingerer ” may be found in very many different walks of life, and is by no means exclusively the product of the militant union or the wearer of an opennecked shirt. Generally speaking, however, the employer is quite capable of taking care in his own interest of the “ white collar ” employee who will not or cannot pull his weight. If parasitism is increasing in private business and industry, and in the populous public service, it is simply because the extent of “ protection ” vouchsafed the employee under .an ultrapaternalistic system has become excessive when it is reinforced by a general but temporary man-power shortage. By the big industrial unions, however, the rights of the employer to discipline the worker who won’t work have been practically nullified. Direct action lost New Zealand 52,000 working days in key industries last year, and the threat of it forces employers in essential war industries to capitulate before unreasonable interpretations of employee privileges. The abuse of power in the hands of the worker in a time of national stress has been a scandal during the past five years, a dark blot upon the proud pages in which history will record New Zealand’s part in the war for democracy. But Mr Semple and the

Government of which he is a shining light have done nothing to deal with these most conspicuous offenders against his honest creed. As a manual worker himself, it is well known, he toiled'hard and purposefully; but as a servant of the public in a higher capacity has he worked as well? The fact is that Mr Semple, and every member of the Government, must accept responsibility for a long, wasteful chronicle of absenteeism and strikes in industry in a time of unprecedented crisis in New Zealand. His hortatory efforts cannot expunge this record of ineffectuality.