The Dominon TUESDAY, AUGUST l1, 1917. THE AUSTRALIAN STRIKE

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3162, 14 August 1917, Page 4

The Dominon TUESDAY, AUGUST 11, 1917. THE AUSTRALIAN STRIKE

Unless reports from Australia by mail and otherwise are misleading there is a distinct possibility that the industrial disorders at presont in evidence in that country may develop into something more "serious The frivolous strike of the New South Wales railwaymen against the. introduction of an improved system of time-keoping has certainly conferred a goldon opportunity upon lAV.W. agitators and other antisocial criminals, some of whom arc no doubt acting as the.paid agents of Germany. It is not at all unlikely that these people are turning the opportunity to account by developing a definite attack upon orderly government in .the Commonwealth. Thero arc 'undoubtedly oxpectations of serious trouble,, and it is clear that a very heavy responsibility rests upon the railwaymen who recently left their employment without having a shadow of justification for that course. The. one good feature of tho situation as far as it has been disclosed is that public opinion has from the first been definitely antagonistic to tho strikers. Tho lazy toleration with which the people of Australia had come to regard industrial disputes and upheavals of all kinds seems at last to have been disturbed, and cortainlynot without reason. Scarcely troubling to pretend that they have a grievance, the railway strikers have deliberately elected to subject many thousands of their fellow-citi-zens toheavy loss, and inconvenience. Many industries quite distinct from tboso in which tho striko arose are for tho , time being, crippled, and tho number of individuals moro or less definitely penalised is enormous. It would be extraordinary if this state of: affaire did not awaken feelings of keen resentment in the people concerned and stimulate- their appreciation of the fact that it baa become possiblo to divert tho forces of organised Labour from the legitimate advancement of social roforms to what can only be regarded as anti-social wrecking. If in the conditions created anarchist agitators and enemy agents find a favourable opportunity of promoting their schemes the immediate outcome may be deplorable, but tho educative value of the strike will bo heightened) "Whether or not it is fated to develop on these lines, the New South ,Wales_ strike brings the people of Australia perceptibly nearor to tho time when they will have to ask themselves whether industrial disorders of this character are consistent, not merely with the welfare, but with tho continued existence of a civilised communityv

The fact is to be faced that in Australia, though not only in Australia, industrial organisations aro showing an increasing tendency to abandon tho constructive activities to which they were formerly devoted for activities which not only lack any semblance of constructive teform, but run directly counter to social progress and bottermuut, and tend continuously to lower and dograde existing standards of industrial efficiency. There still is, as thero always has been, legitimate scope for tho activity of industrial organisations in obtaining' hotter wages and working conditions, but the jfirst essential to continuous improvement on these lines is a recognition of the obligations which rest on Labour—a recognition for one thing that a fair day's pay involves the return of a fair day's work. An intelligent appreciation of realities is tho ono thing needed to correct and remedy the corroding industrial disorders which have developed to such a dangerous extent in Australia- mid have- culminated in thu present strike. Tho workers' who have so often and so easily been induced to clown tools on one vague pretext or another would certainly no loss complaisant if they realised that they arc uudermining, instead of strengthening, their own position, and that stable industrial organisation and the continuity of industrial enterprise are just asjiucussary to the prosperity of their own class as to that of the country at .'Jaim, _. ... .