MOVING APACE.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIX, Issue 83, 29 July 1914, Page 4

MOVING APACE.

Events in the world of unionism are moving on apace, and in remarking this the Wellington Dominion says: In England the cables tell us, the doctors are talking of a medical trades union. In New South Wales the musicians, not content with forming a union of their own, have decided to adopt a protective policy. Some years ago a coterie of Australian artists agitated for a duty on pictures in order to encourage local industry. The musicians in their turn desire to make Australia their own, and any American or other oversea, musician may not be allowed to join the union unless he or she has resided for six months in the State and pays an initiation fee of twenty guineas. The idea i s stated to be to discourage foreign musicians from going to Sydney unless there is work for them to do. The scarcity of work at the present time may be judged from the fact that members of the union are sufficiently opulent to embark on the provision of new club premises at a cost of £20,000, and the union has just raised its secretary’s salary to £6OO a year. The "Musicians’ Union is a by-product of the picture show boom', and membership of it is not yet a sine qua non before musical celebrities can make their debut in Sydney. Its little outburst is interesting as providing as gross / an instance of petty selfishness as the Press has had to chronicle for some time past.