WELLINGTON NOTES. (From Our OWn Correspondent.)

Otago Witness, Issue 2785, 31 July 1907, Page 53

WELLINGTON NOTES. (From Our OWn Correspondent.)

WELLINGTON, July 29. Memorial grants eeem to be very mucH in evidence just now. The other day^ ' the Prime Minister promised some Aucfc-* landers a grant for a Seddon lamp at the ■■ meeting of some cross roads, and now the Cabinet has agreed to give a pound for pound subsidy up to £100 towards the eostf of -erecting a pedestal in memory of Captain Cook at Ship Cove, Queen Charlotte Scund. v A "branch of the New Zealand Socialist party had been formed, which -now numl>ered over 100 , members. The; following motion by. Mr Robert. Hogg, was put to the __ meeting and carried unanimously: — "Thai?" this meeting of the workers of ' Wellington, requests the Minister o*F Labour to ; have prepared .and presented to Parliament, during the present session a return of all deaths from accidents of miners, miners' ' ' wives and children, and other workersoccurring, on the property of the Westport Coal Company during the past five years. # with the amounts of compensation paid, 1! , any;' the number for which the Westport Coal Company were legally responsible, together with the number caused by the faulty administration of the county council in leaving dangerous places unprotected. That this meeting further protests against the degrading system of medical inspection. ; to which the workers must needs submit J before - being given employment in the ■ Westport Coal Company's works, and that it urges the Government to insert in the Workmen's Compensation for Accidents Act an amending clause making it illegal for any company to • insure in its own, funds against liability for accidents to workmen." Speaking at a meeting on Saturday evening, Mr- Miiaren, the seoretary of the Wharf Labourers' Union, and a prominent Labour leader here, said that unless Labour combines its forces throughout this vcountry it will never be treated with anything but indifference and contempt. He" next went on to complain with some heat of Dr Findlay's "brutal and callous references to organised labour," and re-, marked that the only way to keep the Arbitration and Conciliation Act on the Statute. Book was to see that it was administered in a spirit of reasonableness andh conciliation. ' a Mr Way, of Auckland, would (says the Post) have the present Parliament wiped off the map of affairs and replaced by> noble nnd virtuous Socialists. His remark* at the open-air meeting on Saturday night were certainly calculated to cause a breach of the peace if some stalwart and pugnacious politician had chanced along. " These lackadaisical political squibs vp s in * the House of fossils yonder" was almost a term of endearment compared with, some of his references to the honourable members: "We must combine and form a Socialist Labour party to take charge of the legislation of our colony." He airged and then went on to picture the millennium, « when " the man, from the hold in the ship, the carpenter from his bench, the navvy from his drain, and the clerk from his 3esk shall sit in the cushioned seats of the mighty and • smoke the fat cigar of affluence, while the egregious capitalist swings a shovel or an axe." It was a grateful and comforting • ! picture. _____^