THE LABOUR WORLD.

Southland Times, Issue 14633, 25 January 1911, Page 2

THE LABOUR WORLD.

~ PROBLEMS AMD DISCUSSIONS. (By “Worker.") ■ *rlef contributions on matters con Oerninff the Labour Movement are invited; local items are particularly welcome. —Meetings.— Thursday—General Labourers. ' Friday—Carpenters and Joiners. ■Saturday—Smoke Concert to Mr Hodge. y p Sunday—Address on “Christian Democracy,” by Mr Hodge.

Mr John Hodge, Labour. M.P.. * or Gorton, Lancashire, will arrive in Invercargill by the first express on Saturday. and every Labourite who can possibly do so is expected to he at the railway station to greet him. On Satuiuaj evening Mr Hodge will bo entertained at a smoke concert and tickets are now on sale at 2s each. On Sunday evening ' Mr Hodge will deliver an address on “Christian Democracy,” and a subject of this kind should attract a large audience. During his short stay in Invercargill Mr Hodge will be the guest of the Southland Trades’ and Labour Council and the Invercargill branch ot the N. Z. Labour Party. He will leave by the Melbourne boat on Monday. Mr Hodge came to New Zealand to studj the economic conditions of the Dominion, and, as he will have completed ins tour when he reaches Invercargill, the conclusions he has arrived at ought to be worth listening to.

I notice that Mr J. Crosby Smith is convening a meeting for Monday for the purpose of forming a Beautifjmg Society. and it is to be hoped that success will attend his efforts in this direction. This matter concerns the workers especially, as they should endeavour to Inake their surroundings as pleasant as possible, and to have as much air space as can be obtained for themselves and their children. If there had been a Society of this kind in Invercargill when a portion of the Western Reserve was diverted from the purpose for which it was originally intended, more active steps might have been taken to prevent such a happening. I notice that the Hon. George Fowids, on hi: arrival in Auckland after his South African tour. said, in effect, that the necessity of system in town-planning was imperative, and that legislation would need to be enacted to bring this about. He whole-heart-edly condemned the present trend of affairs in New Zealand which was, lie said, in the direction ot depriving the people of sufficient air space and ot routu for recreation.

In European Continental cities matters are entirely different. There the environment of the people is made as pleasant and as beautiful as -possible, and this is looked upon as a sane business proceeding. We do not live to work, we work to live, and if we lose opportunities of making the stay on this old planet as pleasant and as enjoyable as possible for oursi !ves. our children, and our feilowmen, tnen ail the more foolish are we.

Before leaving Mr Crosby Smith. 1 would remind him that many of us tire grill very sore tegarding Athenaeum subscriptions, and it is to he hoped Hint he lias’not yet lost hopes of bringing that State - endowed instiuilion within the reach of being patronised by every person desirous of doing so.

‘Mr G. S. Beeby, New South Wales Minister of Labour, who recently visited Wellington, speaking of the New Zealand Labour Department Vm his return, remarked: "Tills department has for many years past been under the able leadership of Mr Edward Tregear. who has a world-wide reputation for his work, but Wno unfortunately for the Dominion, is retiring from the service. He is visiting Australia shortly. His department lias been aide to do valuable work. The secretary being a man of wide sympathies and sound judgment. lias been able on innumerable occasions? to adjust differences between employers and employees to prevent employers being harassed by over-zealous secretaries, and at the same time to insist on fair and full carrying out of all industrial legislation. The head of the department is, of course, a Minister, but a good deal of the success of New Zealand's experiments can lie attributed to the wise administration of its able .Secretary for Labour.”

In CO years trade unions In. Great Britain have spent CyO.yOo.OOU on strikes.

Mrs Miller, a Queenslander, described as "72 years young, come next •■■lection,” is organising for the Clothing Trades’ Union in her native Stale.

Mr J. <Watson. ex-i 'ederal l.ubuiir Premier. who has lately Ij• j t-*n pushing the ilaily Labour paper scheme before the New South Wales .Miners’ Association in the Newcastle ilistrict, lias been assured tlial a levy of tl per man (rcalIsiimr between HKPM) ami (I'mioii) will be tigreed upon by the miners*. ,d r soil estimates tiiat the A nsiraliali Workers’ I’nion levy alone will brine in over ffO.teiO liy the eml of the year.

Mr Uamsay Macdonald, .M.F.. advises Knglish judges to keep out of political judgments if they want the public to accept their decisions as impartial. He says that in granting an interim injunction against certain spinners, a judge made some observations which ought never to have fallen from a judge's lips. His observations showed that he was absolutely ignorant of what he was talking about, and that he did not understand wlr.it a trade union was. "These, judges," said the M.P., "had better mind their p’s and q’s. If they were going to deliver political speeches on tlie bench, there were going to be political speeches in reply on the platform. He hoped that trade unionism would Iling back in the teeth of ignorant judges opinions which would disgrace a sixth standard school boy.”

The British Government has appointed Mr It. J. Shaeklelun, M.l’., Senior Labour Adviser at the Hume Office, and, of course, .Mr Shackleton liad to resign his seat. Mr Keir Hardie. speaking at Accrington, said that ho felt proud of the fact that when the Liberal Party wanted a man with brains and ability to do certain work they came to the Labour Party for it. Havid Shackleton was the man .Nature intended for the job. A great outcry is being raised in America concerning the glowing amount of prison labour. ft is estimated Unit the penal population is over 100,000, and the prisoners turn out millions of articles of every description - shoes, shirts, overalls, carpets, rug . matting, chairs, brooms, brushes, etc. itecently, however. a National Committee on Prison I,about - lias been ineorporated under the laws of the Stale of New Vork with the object of studying this ijuesliou from every standpoint, and formulating some remedy which shall lie just to all parties concerned the State, the convict. the convict's family, the manufacturer. and the free labourer. it is now a fight between prison labour and free labour. Mr J. Lebovitz, one of the delegates of the National Committee, lias been- interviewed by a representative of the "Shoe Workers’ Journal’’ of Boston, lie says: "Very few people realize how big an industrial army is cooped up in American prisons. Most of them are rot dangerous criminals at all, but simply ordinary working men who happened to trip for the first time. Once be-

hind 11 1 e bars they have to work, otherwise. if left alone in their cells, they go mad. So it happens Unit American prisons are really biK factory villages, in fact, if it wore not for the presence of the tcuartl with his loaded rilic it would Lu* difficult to believe one was not in an ordinary factory. When these y;oods go out into the open market the trouble begins. Convict labour is sold so cheaply'that the prison contractor is able to undersell outside manufacturers, who reduce wages in order to meet this competition. Xew York litis succeeded iu protecting its own manufacturers and working men, but it has not succeeded in keeping out prison-made goods from cit.her States.” It is hoped that the -National Committee will be able to solve the problem.

Reformers blame the capitalist. Socialists do m-t blame liie capitalists, but capitalism.

Stonemasons at Johannesburg (S.A.) have asked for 2s per hour, with an intimation that if they don't get it they will down tools.

The great inventions of the world have been made by working men. The money from great inventions has usually gone to promoters who couldn't invent a decent lie.

The Canadian authorities recently prevented 200 strike breakers from entering Canada from the United Stales as such an action would have been a contravention of the Canadian Labour Laws. Tito scab strike breakers were college principals and medical students.

The seamen’s strike on the Great Lakes in America, which has lasted for three years, lias now readied an acute stage. ■The Lake Shipping Companies are spending money like water, and have scahhunters out all over the country in a vain endeavour to man their ships.

The ‘‘Board of Trade Labour Gazette" says that during November as compared with a year ago most of the principal industries in Great Britain showed an improvement. In the 41G trade unions with a net membership of 675.379 making returns. 20. OSS (or 4.4 per cent.) were reported :is unemployed tit the end of October. 1910. compared with 4.3 per cent, at the end of September, 1910, and 7.1 per cent at the end of October, 1909.

At a large Labour demonstration in Scotland Mr Keir Hardie. M.P.. concluded as follows: “Let there be no mistake about it. the Labour and Socialist movement was going ahead. The present unrest in the Labour world signified that the organised workers were realising the moaning of capitalism! Socialism must he (he ultimate goal of the Labour movement.

Why don't the working men go to church? a.-Us Henry Demurest Lloyd, in the New York Labour Call. Because they are ahead of the church. Because the principles of the Labour movement are more religious than 111 principles of the pulpits. Because the church steadfastly refuses to leave off repeating its glittering seneralitUw. and lacks either tPe conragtv or inteingence to apply the test and language of Che Ten Commandments to the practices of !he men who sit in the high places in the congregations. Because it contents itself with admiring Nathan for telling Icing David to hi-' face ; "Thou art tin* man.” hut dare : not do the same to our nineteenth century robbers mul murderers.

Tolstoy strongly realised the curse of landlordism. Writing in the London Times in lyiC. lie said: —"Cross all Russia. till its peasant world, and one may observe all tin? dreadful calamities and sufferings which proceed from lire obvious cause that the agricultural masses are deprived of laud. Half the Russian peasantry live so that for them the fptestion is not how to improve their position, hm only how not to die of hunger, they and their families, and this only because they have no land.” The remedy lie proposed was the Georgian single tax.

An American millionaire is said to Pave paid £IOO.OOO for a picture by Franz Hals. The painter died in the almshouse. What about capitalism fostering the growth of genius except win-re some ulterior end is sticking out? Under a Socialist order of tilings Hals would not have ended up in the poorhouse.

“Sartor Resartus” is an excellent hook writ ten by the i'’:* ■U ea sage. Thomas Carlyle, which reminds us that although the coronation of King George will not lake place till June, the all-im-portant fiuestion of the clothes to be worn at the function is already receiving tin* a l tent ion of London tailors. for tiie man who holds no official position entitling him to wear a uniform, there lias been designed a “Coronation coat."

A. M. Thrimnsoii, in the T.ondon Clarion. wri I k a line al'tiele on the princiltle of the KeiV.ivm.Uim. He bays that the most powerful and perhaps the only means of i n I ores ting men in the welfare of their country is to make them partake iu the Cuvfi'iimcnt. Tfie Kel’erI'liih'.m compels tlie people to think.

Tim King of Siam, recently dead, owned is eh.-hlv wives, and the suffering country had to keep no less than 100 of is proyeny. It is to be hoped that the Siamese nation did not also have to keep all their poor relations by marriage. as is 'lone in the case of ICuropean royalty.

An application for registration of Urn Australian .i ournali *ls' Association as an organization tinder the Commonwealth (’oneiliation and Arbitration Act lias been lodged with the registrar (.Mr A. AI. Stewart) by Messrs J. McLeod (president) and .Mr H. S. It. Cook (secretary). The association embraces journalists and allied workers engaged in supplying drawings or illustrations to the press, and has a foundation list of I*l*l members. The association is Australian in scope, covering the six States of (he < 'ominon weal th, which are termed, "districts.” Histricls may have as many branches as prescribed membership admits of. Kach district is to bate local autonomy managing its own all-airs in its own way, subject to the control of the (’enlral or Federal body on which it has distincl representation. The Association is largely subject to the direction of Hie annual conference, and the first gathering will take place in .Melbourne in Marcli next.