A CALL TO WORKERS.

Colonist, Volume LXII, Issue 15346, 9 April 1920, Page 2

A CALL TO WORKERS.

BY OTAGO LABOUiI COUNCIL

COST OF LIVING AND WAGES

The Otago Labour Council recently discussed the serious increases in the cost of living, and decided to again call the attention of the public to the gravity of the position. The President (jVIr M. Silyerstone) handed to the Press the following pronouncement:— "The Otago Labour Council desire to call the attention of^ the people to the ever-increasing rise in the cost of living. Though prices of all commodities have been on the increase since August, 1914, they have never been more acute than they are at the present time. Especially within -the last four months have prices risen in New Zealand out of all proportion to the rise in the worker's income.

"The rise in building material, leather, clothing, wheat, flour, etc is unprecedented. The present position justifies the claim of the Labour Party that the present Government have neither the desire nor the ability to relieve the people from the exploitation of the commercial and financial speculators. On

the contrary, high prices are necessary to enable the Capitalist -Government to raise their large revenue and prevent taxation from fallr ing on the shoulders of the rich, who are the only people that benefit by high prices. '"Hie only remedy is for the working class of this country to take control fif the government. To achieve this purpose," the Otago Labour Council call on the workers to rally to the assistance of the trade union movement and/the New Zealand Labour Party, for it is only .%y combined action on the industrial find political field that tne government of this country can be obtained by the working'class."