COMMUNIST EXPERIMENT

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19048, 27 June 1924, Page 8

COMMUNIST EXPERIMENT

An instructive object lesson concerning Socialism in action in the industrial sphere is provided by the events at the large glass works of Albi, Paris, which are (says the Daily Telegraph) owned and managed entirely by workers’ organisations. The board of director* consisted of representatives of the three trade unions, to one or another of ’which all the workmen belong, but some little time ago a dispute arose between the directors and the workmen concerning the pensions scheme As the negotiations seemed to drag on indefinitely, the workmen, growing impatient, took the drastic step of turn ing out the directors and replacing them by an administration committee on which only two of the tly;ee trade unions were represented. The commit tee took possession, and its first act was to dismiss all the workmen who did not ‘belong to one of the two largest unions concerned. It then applied to a civil tribunal for the factory to Inplaced under sequestration, the object being to secure legal possession of the* funds and property previously inchargs of the deposed board. But the original directors prevented any legal decision being reached by applying for a postponement, in order that they might raise the question of competence. Upon this the workmen’s administrative con. mittee withdrew their application, on the ground that the original board of directors had made the continuance of work impossible by causing the pay ments due for goods already sold tG be held up pending a settlement. A mass meeting of the workers decided on the immediate application of a certain order of the day, and, “iu consequence of the tragic events which might follow its execution,” they appointed a second administrative com mittee. having first passed a resolution declaring that, rather than give way on what they held to be their rights, they would perish in the ruins of their factory. Within a few hours flames wore seen to burst from one of the factory buildings, and the fire was spreading rapidly when the police, firemen and troops were hurried to the scene. They found sitting round the blazing building members of the first administrative committee which had turned out the directors, and who spontaneously declared that they had set fire to the factory. They were all arrested amid a demonstration, in which a body of the workers testified approval of their action.