"STRATFORD EVENING POST" WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 1928. UNION FEES.

Stratford Evening Post, Issue 77, 27 June 1928, Page 4

"STRATFORD EVENING POST" WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 1928. UNION FEES.

ACCORDING to cable messages, the cooks' strike, which seems to be settled 'at last, has cost Australia considerably over a million pounds. As is' generally known this upheaval was brought about by the ill-consid-ered action of a fsmall but militant union, which, according to evidence given in-a: case before the* court,consists of 200'men. Th e .' membership fee of this body is something approaching 5s a week, at' which the Chief Judge of the Federal Arbitration Court expressed amazement, .in the course of the hearing*of an application to de-register the body in question, and said it would require a lot of evidence to convince him that it was justified. This bears upon the position of preference of employment for unionists. If to obtain the right to work a man must be a member of a union, obviously the fee for membership should be kept at the lowest possible figure. NotTiing should be provided for in the fee beyond the actual expenses of management of the union as a union. This question has been raised in Britain, where unions claim the right to levy upon members for political purposes. Presumably this applies to the Australian Cooks' Union. As one result of tile disaster which has been wrought members of that union are asking the court to de-register it, so that a new union may be organised, and one of the reasons advanced in support of this is the high membership fee charged.