A THREE-CORNERED FIGHT

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 18, 22 January 1924, Page 6

A THREE-CORNERED FIGHT

If the "Morning Post" writer is correct, the railway strike which has commenced in England is not a duel, but a three-cornered fight between the railyvay companies and two sections of Labour. The facts reported hitherto support this statement. The Engine-drivers' Union, led by the honest, hot-tem-pered Mr. Bromley, has plunged into a strike and endeavoured .to drag the greater National Union of Kailwaymen after it. But the Union, taking wise counsel from its veteran leader, Mr. Thomas, has refused to be dragged. It may be that individual members of the National \Union will cease work ; but they will do so in direct defiance of their own leaders, and Will sanction a course fraught with the utmost danger to organised Labour. The danger is clearly seated *by the President 'of the National Union. "No organisation," he says, "has any right to call on our members to accept its dictates." Yet it is bound to be difficult for the average unionist to accept a cpurse which may be misrepresented as desertion of, other workers, even though those workers are blundering and breaking a compact. All this increases the difficulty facing the incoming Government. If political events follow the anticipated course, Labour will .take office with the first duty of settling ,a dispute which threatens partial paralysis of trade and an increase of ' unemployment. The abstention of the National Union from the strike shows that the engine-drivers have not the support of air Labour; but that will not help a Labour Government if it is called on to decide the issue. No hint has been given of a Labour Government's possible action, probably because ' Labour has no sovereign remedy for this particular malady.