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Press, Volume LV, Issue 16435, 31 January 1919, Page 6

Tn view of what is happening in the industrial world at Home at present 1C is worth while noting some remsnts made by Mr W. A. Appleton, secretary of the General Federation of Trade Unions in Great Britain, in his quarterly report issued in December. He pointed out that whatever Germanywas made to pay, and she ought to pay to the utmost of her capacity, there would remain debts which only British workers could liquidate. There was no way of paying debts which was both easy and honourable, and foolish experiments would only intensify difficulties and suffering. After these romarks, which suggested that he had in his mind. some of the proposals which Labour-extremists are now trying to force on employers, Mr Appleton continued: "What trade unionists hare always been out for is tho fair thing. When they ask for n fair distribution of the fruits of industry they do not overlook tho just claims of those who originate and sustain and those who transport. Prior to tho war this fair share hadt noti been theirs, nor will it be theirs after the \var if they put their trust in politicians. Political power has its uses, but it will not enable the trade unionist or anyone else to override economic law."

Apparently a large number of the rank and file of British trade unionism do not see eye to eye on this point with their leaders, if one can rightly so describe men who too obviously do not lead. The real leaders of an unfortunately numerous section of Labour ab Home are, it appears, young men who show contempt for economic laws and prefer the methods of the Bolshevists which, in the case of Russia; have certainly proved profitable for the heads of the movement, whatever it may havo cost the general mass of the people. The present situation in Britain justifies Mr Lloyd George's remark regarding after-war conditions: "I am not afraid of revolution, but of reaction." Whatever may be the ostensible causes of the many serious labour troubles that are occurring, there can be little doubt that reaction from the strenuous period of the war has done much to create an atmosphere favourable to unrest.

In one of to-day's cables we are told that "the Belfast strike is traceable eu the instigation of a notorious ret>el committee of industrialists on the Clyde," whose methods of inciting strikes are said to resemble Bolshevism. Theso Glasgow Bolshevists had earned a bad reputation among loyalists many months ago. Mr Havelock Wilson, as staunch a Labourite as is to be found in Great Britain, had a taste of their, quality when campaigning in support of the Merchant Seamen's League's boycott of German trade. He addressed a meeting at Shackleton, on the ontskirts of Glasgow, at which, he eaid, it was evident all the Bolshevists of the Clyde had got together. They jeered at his stories of the tragedies of the Lusitania, Belgian Prince, and other crimes, and when he told of 15,000 British seamen being murdered by the Germans there were shouts that they (the British seamen) got paid for it. They gave three cheers for Lenin and Ttotzky, and yelled that it would not matter if the German flag flew over Great Britain. They all appeared to be young men, from 19 to 26, and in Mr Wilson's opinion, "were evidently trench-dodgers of the worst class" not exactly the sort of men whom one could wish to see directing British Labour in the most critical period of the industrial history of the country.

It is to be hoped, for the sake of the peace of Eastern Europe, that the warning addressed by the Peace Conference to thoso States still employing force to gain territory, will not fall on wholly deaf cars. If. say the delegates, these small peoples expect justice they must refrain from force, and place their claims before the Conference. Today's meeage indicates the peoples between whom trouble has been occurring. The dispute between the Serbians and Italians no doubt has arisen over the possession of Fiume, which Italy desired and the Serbc-Croats seized in November. The Roumanians and Serbs have probably disagreed over the former's claims to Transylvania, which forms thomorthern boundary of Serbia. The Ukrainians, who have been working with the Iluthenians in Galicia. came info conflict, as we mentioned yesterday, with the Poles .it Lemberg, and doubtless elsewhere, while tho movement for creating a Czecbo-Slovak State in Bohemia and Moravia has possibly caused friction between the Cfcechs in

those areas and the Poles in Western Galicia. It is not clear why tho Georgians and Armenians should fall out, unless it is that the former suspect tho latter of having dealings with the Bolshovists, as some of them had at Baku. Tho difficulties between the Arabs and Syrians arc not improbably connected with the Arabs' hope of forming an Arabian kingdom based on Aleppo, a design which may not fall in with British ideas

The Hungarian Government, it is stated, is preparing to pro&t by the quarrels of the new nations on what used to be Hungarian territory. This is the more probable, because at present tho Hungarian Stato is practically the city republic of Budapest, and the adjoining plain, and naturally i s dissatisfied with its position. That is the last stronghold of the Magyars, who are paying, in their reduction to comparative insignificance, for their oppressive rulo over the other nationalities in Hungary. Exactly what is happening just now in tho dismembered Empire of Austria-Hungary is not at all clear, but last month, according to Dr. Harold Williams, who had been on the spot, Jugo-Slavs, Roumanians, Ruthenians and Czecho-Siovaks were claiming altogether 83 Hungarian provinces, and as there are only 63 of these provinces, there was clearly some over-lapping of claims and inferentially a good deal of friction, while the Magyars appeared to bo in some danger of being squeezed off the map altogether. The races who are thus dividing Hungary between them show no disposition to help Budapest in any way, and as they occupy tho richest coalfields and agricultural districts, the city is short, both of coal and food.