TRADES UNIONS

Southland Times, Issue 22113, 6 September 1933, Page 7

TRADES UNIONS

CONGRESS IN BRITAIN. CRUCIAL STAGE REACHED. (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright.) London, September 4. The Trades Union Congress has opened at Brighton and is admittedly at a crucial stage in the history of organized labour. The speeches are practically unanimous in denouncing a political dictatorship ill various European forms. Mr A. G. Walkden, general secretary of the Railway Clerks’ Association of Great Britain, in his presidential address, expressed the opinion that the classes who felt their dominance slipping away were making a determined effort to re-establish it. Democracy was being assailed because it had been successful —not because it had failed. Fascism everywhere was anti-parlia-mentarian and fanatically anti-socialist, exploiting the patriotism and enthusiasm of a generation, which had grown up since the war. Mr Walkden appealed to young people not to be led away by flashy new movements whose goal was a political dictatorship culminating in a state of absolutism which denied free voluntary organizations the right to exist. DECREASED MEMBERSHIP. (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright.) (Rec. 5.5 p.m.) Rugby, September 4. The annual Trades Union Congress opened at Brighton this morning when 564 delegates represented 208 unions with a membership of 3,367,911, a decrease since the last congress of 245,362. BRITISH LABOUR PARTY LEADERSHIP NOT IN DISPUTE. (British Official Wireless.) Rugby, September 4. According to the political correspondent of the News-Chronicle Mr Arthur Henderson’s election for Clay Cross definitely does not raise the question of his succeeding Mr George Lansbury as the leader of the Labour Parliamentary Party.