NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1097, 8 April 1911, Page 4

NOTES OF THE DAY.

e , We ' reviewed a few days ago the most recent available newspaper comment on the "annexation scare" which had been fostered by way of thwarting the Canadian-American Reciprocity Agreement. We indicated that those who saw in closer trade relations between the two great North American nations a danger to Imperial unity had failed to ; dispose of the evidence which went to show that (whatever the fears or hopes of controversialists)' reciprocity would, in the natural course of events, remove from the Canadian political horizon a temptation to seek absorption in the United States. Even now the answer to that view of the situation is not forthcoming, but we note, on the other hand, that it has received further confirmation in a statement, by Mr. James D. , Macgregor, a prominent Canadian, and managing director of the South Alberta Land Company. Mr. Macgregor, when"interviewed in London the other clay by the Evening Standard, declared that there was nothing in the talk about annexation. "The' United States doesn't want to annex Canada- any more than we want to be annexed." He considered that Canada could not fail to profit by the removal of the United States tariff wall against her food products: Canada' has a large market to the South, with eighty millions of people who have maintained a high tariff against her. Therefore she has had to go over to England to market a great deal of her stuff, and she did not fret the same return for labour as the American farmer got. As far as loyalty is concerned, the way to make people disloyal is to handicap them in the matter of selling. To keep people loyal you must -keep them prosperous. .There is a robust common sense in Mr.' Macgregor's point of view which will- appeal to most people, and until somebody shows it to be anything else, we do not think Imperialists need be afraid of the reciprocity question. "

The City Council may have a cleatidea of what it is doing in connection with the tramway advertising question; but to the onlooker it would seem that the Council has got itself into a discreditable muddle. In the first place it called for tenders and accepted the highest. This tenderer withdrew, and without giving anyone else an opportunity it proceeds to accept a new offer, at the same price as the original highest tender, on the ground that the tenderer who withdrew was really the tenderer who came in after tenders had closed. It is a little amusing to note the efforts of certain Councillors to prove that the original successful tenderer (Mr. Goldfinch) was really someone else than Mr. Goldfinch—namely, a firm trading as Lucas Browne,' who have been permitted to come in with a fresh offer after the tender of Mr. Goldfinch has been accepted and withdrawn. Mr. Goldfinch's letter speaks for itself. It reads as follows: Through the publication of the figures before the contract was definitely settled showing my figures (o bo considerably higher - than the other tenders, I am now unable to procure tho necessary sureties. 1 must, therefore, withdraw my tender. .... I am, however, in a position to submit an amended tender with the necessary sureties. P. J.- GOLDFINCH. It will be seen that- Mr. Goldfinch says I am unable, and 1 must therefore withdraw my tender. I, again, am in a position to submit an amended tender. It is claimed, of course, that Mr. Goldfinch wrote as . the representative of Lucas Browne, but has since left that firm's employ. In any case the fact remains that he withdrew tho tender which the Council had accepted and the Council has now, without calling for fresh tenders, accepted another substituted for it. -Whatever the Council may say regarding the wisdom of its action from a financial point of view no one can doubt that it has set a very bad precedent in admitting this fresh or revised tender without giving the other tenderers the same opportunity to amend their tenders. Moreover, we doubt very much, from a perusal of the terms of the letter of Lucas Browne, whether the Council has really got a definite offer at all under the terms of tho original conditions laid down. The firm of Lucas Browne has very, shrewdly seen the weakness of the whole proposition. Its canvassers, it argues, may be able to get business to an amount that will repay them at the price tendered, but the corporation may refuse to accept the form in which the business notices are to be displayed in the carp. So it asks the corporation, in effect, to make some other arrangement—presumably one in which Lucas Browne will act As the agents of the corporation, being paid on commission, .Councillors Fletcher and

Smitii, and those who supported them, were quite right in the stand they took, and it is probable that the Council will he forccd to recognise this before long. .

'It is not surprising to find t-hat in connection with the outcry against trusts and combines, which forms part of the Labour campaign in favour of the referendum proposals now agitating citizens of the Commonwealth,- the war has at last been carried into the enemy's camp. What is a trade union, it is asked, if it is not a combine or monopoly ? Under the referendum proposals the definition of a monopoly or combination or trust is so wide that the Labour leaders arc experiencing some embarrassment in their endeavour to answer the question stated above. They get over their difficulty, however, by submitting that the proposal is to deal only with harmful combinations. Mit. Wade, late Premier of New South Wales, deals with the other side of the question very neatly. He said in a recent speech: Tho monopoly or combination or trustas applied to 'capital meant any agreement to limit the production or supply of any particular commodity or service, and taking advantage of this limitation to extort extravagant prices from the public. But a trade union was a combination to limit the supply of labour, thereby to increase tho rate of wages to its members. Their lines of action were the same.. Manufacturers' trusts, it was said, permitted the establishment of only such additional mills as should increase the market supply. The union only allowed a certain number of apprentices to learn that trade. Manufacturers fixed a minimum price for the goods sold in the market. Tho unions aimed at fixing a scale of wages below which jio member of tho union shall work. If there were moro labourers in the Union than could be employed at the advanced rate of wages some must be idle. If there were more mills in the trust than the demand for the goods allowed to be kept busy somo must bo shut down. Trade unions boycott competing workmen outside their ranks, and stigmatise them as blacklegs and scabs. The trusts endeavour to punish every outside manufacturer by forcing upon him such a competition as will cause his ruin. Thero can-be little doubt, therefore, that a trade union comes under the definition of monopoly or combination. Mr. Wade added that as capitalistic monopolies and combinations were liable on that ground alone to' be attacked or controlled by the Commonwealth, then' it w : as not unreasonable to expect provision will be made for regulating the • uses to which union fees may be put. As to the contention of the Labour leaders that it is only intended to deal with injurious combinations, _ Mr. Wade contends .that 'if this is so, then Mil. Hughes and his friends will, find it difficult to justify the bitter attack, they have been hurling against such alleged monopolies as the Sugar Company and tho Tobacco Trust. No one could doubt that their list of prices to the consumer was reasonable and that being the case, how could they be attacked and the trades unions cscape 2 In America organised labour has been attacked as an injurious combing or trust ior a, long time past, but it has not until recently been seriously forced to face this line of argument in'the Commonwealth.