The Daily News TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22. LABOUR CONDITIONS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 230, 22 September 1908, Page 2

The Daily News TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22. LABOUR CONDITIONS.

Xlie people of this Dominion have been tolil liy a .Minister of the Crown that men cannot he liiiuli! to work if ihcy are against doing so. A legal member of tin 1 House, pulling niucn the same matter in a dillVrcni nay, says thai he doe.-, not think it is possible to prevent strikes, whilst the president of flic Arbitration Court has alumied that strikes iiml arbitration eairnot exist at the same time. This is the position as it stands. It must ho confessed that it does -not look very hopeful; yet, the Arbitration Bill now being considered by Parliament is hi the main an attempt to put down sunken with an iron hand. In these columns it has been oppressed that the purpose of the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act was in the highest degree beTie.h'cient; it was designated to reconcile warring elements whose strife was prejudicial to the. whole community; to iirbig to jmiss a" era of peaceful industrial development.

1 111'. J. 1A Arnold, a ropri'smhui\\» of I Labor in tire House of llepi'esentativos, asserts that what 'ho characterises as the "ea,' canny" system ....s lc.iuited in the workers having "to hand over two and a-half days' pay to their la milords, and then not nave siillicie-.it lo I keep tile house going wilii necessaries.' 1 Did Mr. Arnold, or the workers he so I a.bly represents, imagine that the ArhitI ration Act would materially euange I that position' Do not the workers I realise that the valun of our products lis not, and can never be, regulated by the conditions prevailing in New Zealand; and that, if the prices of labor food and tlothing are raised beyom the economic level, we practically snul the door of the Home market against

If, for instance, the farmer has to pay large sums for labor and susten- " aiKe he looks to get all -back again \< out of the sale of his produce. But it " the cost of his production is high and Z the market rate in England is low, he n stands a chance to lose instead ol gain. ! It would be useless for him to send his produce home when Ire could not N realise to cover his expenses. laus ' by unreasonably handicapping the far- j mur we losj the market in England, and it is from the Motherland all our money is derived. What applies to ' the. farmer applies to every industry. ) The wages ol labor cannot be raised ' without consequences following into ' every branch of industry. During the last fifteen years the wages of work- ■[ ers have risen, and as a consequence the prices of commodities hare risen, anil the workers may rely upon it, that this consequence'will always follow. Prices rise and fall in proportion to the value of labor, for the cost of laiboi- is the basic consideration of every industry. There are natural economic lawa wjndl ale beyond the power ol nay Parliament to change. Tile worker.-. 1 do not understand tn's; their aspiration is to see their wages go up wailst 'the prices of commodities remain iow—a perfectly impossible condition. Disappointed and impatient, a considerable section have done their best to destroy the Act which has done a very/ great "deal tor llieiu. In BUM, there! were no I ewer than (iOO girls working j for nothing; in fact, they were being quietly swindled out of their hrbor and ! their time. Thai kmd of thing, and I

sweating on all its forms, have been swept away. The hours .of labor and,, tile conditions of labor have greatly improved, and it is disheartening to find that instead of appreciation the workers have assumed Hie diameter of wreckers. Jl has been pleaded for them that "men clime from Australia, deliberately fomented a. strike, "and then departed, leaving the married men to shoulder the responsibility."' Putting it in plain words it is asked to he ' believed that the workers are no more that a lot of foolish children easily gulled by any irresponsible, light-heart-ed blithercrs that chance to enmc- along. I'ucomplinientary as this may lie lo the workers, it may be accepted as an i-xcuse, but it opens the door 10. the suggestion that the experiences of the past may be repeated in the future. Jiorc especially is this the case wiien 5 Jlr. Arnold, a little iniUier on in his .speech, is found asserting that "w|e are gradually creating in our cities the l squalor, the poverty, the congestion, I and the dirty corners that were in B cities of the Old Land, while on the ' oilier hand we saw riches heaping nip." What has this got to do with the Arbitration Bill? Does Jlr, .A mom expect that an Arbitration Bill should provide for t lie evils of which he p speaks'; He is here guilly of talking to the workers in precisely the same way as the blitherers from Australia are said to have done; but a responsibility attaches lo him from which they al least were free. Jlr. Arnold is it representative of tint people, Jtjio matti i- to which Jlr. Arnold refers had -been before the House in a previous ,vory interesting debate. To talk in • this idle fashion on such a question as the Arbitration Bill only accentuates the liability of the workers to being ,'cgregiously misled. The Uoverninent are (irmly of opinion that under the , Arbitration Bill now before the House the principle can be made to work suc- •■ ccssfully, and it is sincerely to be hop--1 ed that they are right. The evidence I given—that of Jlr. Arnold particularly —(points, however, to a different conclusion, "Unrest" and "discontent" still seem to prevail. When appeal is made 1 to the Anbitraticm Court men come with heated imaginations and -rancorous feelings, the result of speeches delivered by men who apparently are unable to think cons.t-ntively.' It remains to be seen whether the Bill now under discussion will, when it is placed on the Statute Book, as no doubt it ■will be, prove the panacea for the ills of labor and improve the unsatisfactory conditions which have arisen.