CHARGES OF BESETTING

Taranaki Daily News, 15 July 1933, Page 9

CHARGES OF BESETTING

RELIEF WORKERS IN COURT MEMBERS OF PICKETS REMANDED. REFUSAL TO RECOGNISE COURT. NO APPLICATION MADE FOR BAIL. By Telegraph—Press Association. Wellington, July Four men who have been taking a prominent part in the relief workers’ strike were arrested in their homes last night and charged before Mr. E. Page. S.M., to-day with unlawfully besetting a place where relief workers were engaged with a view to compelling them to abstain from doing acts which they had a legal right to do. The men refused to enter pleas. They were Charles Norris Brooks, aged 37, Richard Henry Webb, aged 28, Charles Frederick Barker, aged 49 and John Harvey Blair, aged 37. Blair said that he thought it farcical to plead and Webb said he refused to recognise the Court. The police, in asking for a remand, said that the accused were at the head of a group of about 350 men which visited relief jobs endeavouring to get men to leave work. In order to avoid trouble the men had been taken off their jobs when the group was seen approaching. Substantial bail was suggested, but counsel for the accused intimated that bail was not asked for and the remand was not opposed. The men were remanded till Tuesday.

“COMRADE KELLY” AT HASTINGS. MASS MEETING’S RESOLUTION. ♦ Hastings, Last Night. A meeting of 200 striking relief workers was addressed at Hastings this afternoon by a Wellington man, Mr. Kelly, who was referred to by the chairman, Mr. >F. J. Spear, as Comrade Kelly. Throughout the proceedings criticism of the strike news appearing in the Press was made, it being stated that the position regarding the number of men on strike in other centres had been misrepresented. Another feature of the procedings was the omission to put to the vote the Hastings central relief committee’s proposals that a secret ballot on the strike should be held.

The following resolution was unanimously adopted: “That this mass meeting of relief workers of Hastings, having been on strike for over a fortnight and recognising that our delegates have visited the main centres for support in the struggle and that Wellington is definitely out in support and that many other centres are preparing to support us, we look upon the. statements given to the Press by Mr. S. Vella and Mr. D. McLaughlin on behalf of the National Union of Unemployed as misleading and a deliberate attempt to use a biassed Press to weaken the' strike. We emphatically condemn their attitude and are of the opinion that they are acting purely as strike-breakers and against the best interests of the working class.”