BENEFITS OF TRADES UNIONISM.

Waikato Times, Volume 92, Issue 14361, 12 May 1920, Page 6

BENEFITS OF TRADES UNIONISM.

(To the Editor.) Sir,- —In your issue of May 7th you say in your leader, “It would probably be" useless, to suggest to Labour that trade unions should be abolished. They have done an excellent work and have been of immense benefit lo Labour in many ways. It is. however, doubtful whether they arc not doing more barm than good to their supporters at the present time, while their effect on the welfare of the country is frequently very bad.” Your leader-writer also argues for longer hours of labour and hints that Hie workers would prefer -a longer day were U not for Hie competition of fiic various unions. Furthermore apparently, he means that trade union's keep down wages and lead up to unmannerly strikes, with strikers behaving like*'“naughty children.” To this indictment perhaps you will permit me** to make a very brief reply. As to abolishing unions, the lamentable history of labour furnishes at once the explanation and justification of their existence. The close of the .Napoleonic struggle-a century ago was followed by the same economic disturbances as those that nowmark the end of the lab; (war,. In ISIS “trade unionism was a penal offence, and,'the unhappy worker between. e--upper millstone of high prices amf-lfionother millstone of reduced wiigoC av3s -ground to po.wder, and so hilmeldiJs .was-the system that humane and*'philanthropic men were drawn into the vortex and involuntarily became oppressors of their unfortunate employees, and tenants. It took the British worker,7o years to painfully win back the rights due to his manhood and to emancipate Ids babes from the infant slavery that gave to the factory inferno of 100 years ago its own peculiar horror. And if there were no trade unions what would lie the condition of tile worker, not only hero in New Zealand, but in all parts of the world .to-day:' .The prices of clothes, food and household necessities leap up without warning and without finality. Take the last item alone. A dinnerplate costs. Is 9d retail, a cup and saucer eanffoTbd;purchased under Is Gd and it is almost certain that in a very short time:the price will be 2s lid. What-oharice would unorganised and isolated workers'have against this furious, rushing tide of extravagant increases in bare necessities? In our own union we have had literally to, sleep’ on our arms in order not lo be overwhelmed, and whatever your loader writer may assert, we trade unionists know that if we had not been organised we. should have been lost. It shoujfb also never be forgotten -that the union protects the weakling, and sees, as far as it can, that amid Hie merciless scramble he is not trodden down. The van, we arc proud to say, halts continually in order lo keep in touch with Hie rear. We do not want Hie race to be lo the swift or the battle to the strong. Wc arc ready always, like Nelson to risk all rather than to abandon ah -unfortunate less richly dowefccL than, the elite in our ranks. Perhaps the. fully-equipped, mentally alert-, physically sound workman might hold Ins-own, but what then? Do we. want a condition of things which would doom,CATTY fnfufl.below the standard of first-class to the condition of a helot all the days;of his- life? If not for our own • sake,' (lien Yor the sake of our weaker, brethren wo stand together. As to shorter hours—yes, wc want shorter hours. It is not, for another man to tell me that I must work longer because I am not educated .enough to use my‘ leisure wisely. Of the use, or the abuse, of that leisure I am answerable lo a higher tribunal than any sot up by.society; but that apart, nothing is gained by long hours of labour. The brain dulls, the eye dims the muscles relax, the nerves fail. The madness that kept a- signalman 16 hours in the signal-box was punished and exposed when the express passed unwarned lo frightful destruction, and whatever Hie slave-drivers may say, the community benefits nothing by the existence of a

work-sodden proletariate and no society ever has. Again, as to strikes. No responsible labour leader and no workingman loves strikes. Why should they? But there is such a thins' as the last, ditch, and when il is reached it is Cor freemen to ask anil answer whether retreat will then avail anything. Take the recent action of the railwaymcn. Docs anyone deny the .justice of their cause or the moderation and patience with which it was urged? and while a complacent Department temporises and a cautious Prime Minister postpones, prices mount continually and sweep on like the Severn Bore. Who can wonder that they ceased work? Hope deferred makes the heart sick. It' I must be ruined let me be overwhelmed at once, not destroyed by the steady, remorseless rise of a mighty tide drawn from abyssmal depths. But I reveal no union secrets when I say that union leaders hold strikes back. The very strike which formed the text for your leaderwriter's remarks was a strike of nonunionists. An organisation at once strengthens and restrains the worker substituting as it does collective action for individual caprice or uninformed impulse. The great, the beneficent, history of tradr-s unionism shows, not the irresponsibility of the untaught and blatant demogogue as the driving force in its councils, but the-moderation, the sobriety, the practical idealism of such nient as B,urt, who sharing the workers' sorrows and knowing the travail of ins life, urged him on with words of practical counsel ami encouraged him by the example of a lite of unremitting toil. Finally, why should unions disband in the face of capitalistic organisations? Masters' trusts, cartels, group the employers together. What is taken by them will be also taken by us, viz., the right to combine for mutual counsel, assistance, and—at any rate in our case —defence. And we are vigilant, not only because the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, but because we are the guardians of our children's rights, and dare not reduce their already foo slender inheritance.— I am, etc.

J. MORRIS. Secretary Auckland Grocers' Union (Waikato Branch).