SEAMEN OUT NOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 237, 6 October 1928, Page 9

SEAMEN OUT NOW.

JOIN WATERSIDERS. Fierce Fight On Melbourne Wharves. VOLUNTEERS STAND.FIRM. (Received 11 a.m.)' MELBOURNE, this day. About 600 seamen from fourteen inter-State vessels struck, refusing to work with the volunteers. More than 3000 volunteers have been enrolled on the Melbourne wharves and 1500 are working.

Further acts of violence are reported. Strikers hurled blue metal when the volunteers were leaving the Nestor, a fierce fight ensuing. The volunteers, however, stood their ground, only one of their number heing seriously injured. He was sent to hospital. The Trades Unions Council continues its conference at Melbourne in spite of tlie result of the meeting with the Prime Minister, Mr. Bruce, and the employers' declaration that obedience to the law must precede a conference between the parties. . .'• ... Precautions were taken to 'preserve secrecy of the conference's deliberations. The supporters of Mr! Jock Garden are believed to be losing ground, owing to a suspicion that their activities are aimed at damage to the party's political standing. . V. ■•■ ; In the' .Arbitration Court Chief Judge Dethridge, in "refusing to suspend the preference, clauses in the new award for North Queensland ports, advised the waterside workers to "Work, work; do not piay the fool." • . Nearly 600 members of the Waterside Workers' Federation were picked up yesterday morning at Port Adelaide, but they had to await the exhaustion of the supply-'of free labour before they were engaged. About 1000 of them remained unemployed. They bombarded the president of the union, Mr. Whitfield, with complaints.- His reply was that the men who were left comprised the Bolshevik element.