CONCILIATION OR STRIKES?

Otago Witness, Issue 3112, 5 November 1913, Page 80

CONCILIATION OR STRIKES?

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER. (Per Favour of the Otago..Witness). Dear, Mr Massey,—l do not think you can have felt either surprise or disappointment on finding / that your proposals for the amendment of “ the Act” have roused to fury the emissaries of the (dis)-United Federation of Labour and their allies in the “Liberal” party. It is just 'what was to be expected, and the cause is obvious. When the Waihi Miners’ Union, the head centre of the Federation, cancelled its registration under the Act in order to be able 1 to strike with impunity, it found itself euchred by the creation and registration of a “scab” union consisting mainly of those of its former members who had the courage to throw off the intolerable yoke of “the Semples, the Webbs, and the Hickeys, who had so long tyrannised over them. The registration of this union was seized upon as the pretext for the strike, and an agitation was started with the view of getting the “ Liberal ” Government to make such alterations in the Act as would render it impossible for a “scab” union to be registered in such circumstances. In short, the ringleaders of the Federation had the audacity not merely to ask but to demand that an Act amended for the prevention of strikes should be transformed into a measure to facilitate the carrying on of strikes, and . go to place the community at the mercy / of a .number of federated; unipus whenever they decided to cancel theii'v.regis- ■ tration with the view of j carrying out a policy of “direct action”! - You, no doubt, remember that a deputation from the Federation waited upon ycfcir imhiediato predecessor, the Minister of Labour in the Caucus Ministry, to bring this demand under big notice, and that, as might bo expected of a Socialist-Radical, he gave? this arrogant deputation every encouragement; but, fortunately for the community, a change oi Ministry took the matter out, of’ bis hands, r and, instead of the Act being altered to suit the Sociahet-Syndicallst revolutiontaries, the Waihi revolt was crushed. Thereupon, the notorious Labour Conference of January last was convened to concert measures for dealing with “scab” unionism, and I 'have no doubt you still have a lively recollection of the impudent deputation that presented to you this preposterous demand in the - sacred name of Organised Labour. The* unions had become so accustomed to have their every whim gratified that they had come to think they bad simply to ask'and it must be granted unto them. This reference to recent history is intended not merely as an introduction to my remarks on your Bill, .but also as a reminder to a community that has a grand .memory tor forgetting merely administrative services rendered by the Government. The probabilities are that, if there had been no change of Government, it is not the Waihi strike that would have been crushed, but the Waihi 4 scab ” union, and your proposals for the amendment of the Act are, I conclude, your response to the demands of the Federation. Instead of asking Parliaunent to convert the Act into an instrument for enabling the Federation to carry out its plans for a general strike, as your predecessor would probably have done, you nave actually dared to flout Organised Labour by submitting amendments for the improvement of ttie Act as a means of preventing strikes! And this, forsooth, is your conception of a “ square deal ” for Labour ! putting the interests of the community before those of this powerful Federation! As I understand your proposed additions, they are designed to give effect, to some extent, to the original purpose for which the system was set up by Mr Reeves — namely, to facilitate the settlement of industrial disputes by conciliation. As everybody knows, the provisions designed to promote conciliation were so perverted and abused by the unions that the'Reeves system never received <l- fair tri&l, and it was converted into a scheme of legal regulation and coercion enforced against employers by a multiplicity of ‘penalties. This change was brought about by pressure of the unions brought to bear upon the Government and Parliament through a Socialistic Labour Department, and after a few years the conciliation provisions were eliminated altogether. It is a significant fact that the opposition to your proposals proceeds mainly from those Socialistic “bosses” of militant unionism, whoso policy it has been to discourage conciliation and agreements, but who are now described by their Milwaukee spokesman as “ struggling for a peaceful adjustment of industrial disputes ’ So -ar is this from being., their attitude that they are struggling to make the public believe that proposals that are in complete u<*iord with the original Reeves scheme of conciliation are wickedly designed for the express purpose of destroying unionism, by depriving it of its sacred rights, and restoring the old penal enactments against the combination and organisation, of Labour. It might with equal justice be contended that the Reeves Act, which purported to be designed for the encouragement of unionism, was hostile to it because it made strikes and lockouts' illegal during the pendency of proceedings before a Conciliation Board. But any person who reads. only the denunciations and misrepresentations of the Socialist-Syn-dicalists and their Liberal” and Radical allies would be' led to believe that your addition to the Act is the outcome of a deep-laid scheme to strangle unionism by making strikes in any and every shape illegal and punishable, with the ferocious penalties. It would be difficult to conceive a more daring misrepresentation of facts X presume it was this demand of the Federation that led you to realise the necessity for some such' change as that which you now propose. It was not to be expected that Mr Reeves should have realised, 20 years ago, the potentialities for evil of Socialist-Syndicalist unionism, and the consequent necessity for some safeguard against the abuse of the provisions relating to the cancellation of registration. Now that a. federation exists, so formidable in its lami-

ficatione, and so unscrupulous in its methods, and designed for the express purpose of carrying out strikes on a large scale, it is simply absurd that the Act should,- on the one hand, encourage trade unions to . register as industrial unions, and, on the other hand, should facilitate the cancellation of such registration, without providing any safeguard against its being perverted by diabolical ingenuity into an instrument of the general strike. Personally I am neither ashamed nor afraid to avow my'conviction that that kind of, unionism which allows itself to become a tool in the hands of revolutionaries like our Semples, our Webbs, our Hickeys, our Tregears, and the Milwaukee ‘‘Professor” is a dire menace to the welfare of the community and should be treated as such, instead of being fostered arid encouraged. But that is neither here nor there, as lam not a politician. But what does concern us, politicians and private citizens alike, is the fapt that a regular campaign of misrepresentation ia now being carried on by the revolutionaries, aided and abetted by their secret allies in the ranks of “Liberalism” and Radicalism, and by the Opposition press, with; the object of making it appear that you and your colleagues and party are endeavouring to use the Act to crush legitimate unionism. The truth is, however, that any .measure calculated to check the Federation must necessarily aid and foster legitimate tradeunionism.

And now, in conclusion, a few remarks of a more general nature. It must be admitted that if your proposals become law wo shall then have made an important addition to the structure of our system of Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration, which is even like nothing else but a house that has been patched and added to in different styles of architecture, and is such as no man in his senses could have designed as a whole. Your addition is based upon the assumption that the Court of Arbitration must be retained; but there can, I think, be little doubt that future developments will bo in the direction either of State regulation of industry by means of wages boards, or of the Canadian system of conciliation. Of the two the latter is probably the better; but the probabilities areHn favour of the Victorian system, as both employers and workers have become so accustomed to legal regulation that, like prisoners who have become, used to their fetters, 'thoy shrink from the risks and responsibilities of Liberty. There can, I believei, be little doubt that your addition would hasten the change in one or other of those' directions. As for the expense of the system, it is altogether out of proportion both to the benefit derived from it and to the necessities of the case.—Yours truly. , ■ J. MacGeegok. Dunedin, October 15, 1913. ,