TRADES DISPUTES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26078, 15 February 1946, Page 5

TRADES DISPUTES

BILL’S SECOND READING STORMY SCENES IN HOUSE (Rec. 8.10 p.m,) LONDON, Feb. 14. Labour members in the House of Commons sang the “Red Flag’/ in the Commons division lobby last night, when the Trades Dispute Bill, which repfeals the 1927 Conservative Government’s Trade Disputes Act, passed its second reading by 369 votes to 194. The division followed stormy scenes, in which Mr Bevin roused the Opposition to roars of protest and Government supporters to ecstatic cheers with his version of the events leading to the 1926 general strike, which he said he had waited 20 years to disclose. Mr Bevin declared the return to the gold standard when Mr Churchill was Chancellor of the Exchequer upset trade union agreements and caused widespread strikes and unemployment. He blamed the Conservative Party, Mr Churchill, and “the City” for the industrial troubles which culminated in the general strike This produced an uproar, in which even Mr Bevin’s powerful vqice was sometimes drowned. Mr Bevin maintained that the general strike was not a strike against the State. He declared the 1927 Act put him under an unjustified stigma. The Times in a leader says: In the midst of a week marked by grave reports of world-wide distress and discontent. the deliberate renewal of an old party battle could be scarcely more misguided. The depth of feeling engendered by the memory of a 20-year-old defeat was vividly displayed in Mr Bevin’s speech, which he delivered despite heavy commitments elsewhere.” , _____