The Times. Published on Tuesday and Friday Afternoons. FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1921. A BLIGHT ON THE COUNTRY*

Franklin Times, Volume 9, Issue 613, 4 March 1921, Page 4

The Times. Published on Tuesday and Friday Afternoons.

FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1921. A BLIGHT ON THE COUNTRY*

New Zealand is a grand country. Its resources are unbounded and its prospects are the fairest on the earth. But it is suffering from a blight which, if not checked, will ruin it entirely and lay waste its possibilities. The pity of it is that this blight is curable and preventable, if only the Government would realise the fact and take a grip of things and act. The blight is man made and is known to the country as the labour leader blight. To-day, in this country, three or four parasites, who by frothy mouthed utterances have subdued the honest workers into apologies for manhood, are holding up the industries and paralysing trade. Believing themselves heaven sent deliverers of the sons of toil, they blabber and bother and badger, until they rope in the unthinking masses of the workers and stampede them into paying them handsome salaries to stir up trouble. The time has come to teach these leaders a salutary lesson. We would urge that a secret ballot be taken of all the workers in the Dominion on the question as to whether these Empire haters should not be interned on Somes Island for at least three years. We are so sure of the solidarity of true labour for patriotism and common sense, ■ that we will wager that they would welcome the chance to toss these “old men of the sea” off their backs and be allowed to work uninterruptedly for those three years, that they would rush the chance. Are the labour leaders game to take up this challenge? We believe not. Theirs is not that type of manhood that would welcome the test. They prefer to meddle and muddle and inflict hardship on helpless women and suffering on still more helpless children. Bah! There is nothing quite so contemptible as your labour leader. The reptile is a lovable creature in comparison. It strikes in the back certainly, but it only damages one victim at a time. But never mind the secret ballot. The people of the Dominion have elected representatives to govern them. Let these representatives interpret the opinion of the vast majority of the people of New Zealand and intern and deport every agitator or any wild-eyed parasite that looks like an agitator, and peace will quickly reign, industrially speaking, in this fair land. At the present time it is a moot point which ,is the more powerful in this country, the Cabinet or the labour leaders. Why not put the matter definitely to the test and decide once and for all who is to rule. The country is sick and tired to death of the half mad antics of a depraved few who “lead” the jelly fish masses of labour. It might be asked why a country journal like the Times should seek to concern itself with matters of Dominion importance. The answer is that it is the duty of the whole of the jrress in New Zealand to express its abhorrence of the present hold up of industries and the interference with the domestic life of thousands through the shortage of coal and commodities lying on shipboard. The Times upholds and believes in sane and moderate labour, and its just aims, but it will never cease its denunciation of the strangle hold methods adopted by a class of labour because its leaders beckon the finger. The tyranny of labour is a blot on this country and the sooner the Parliament of the Dc minion i.ieno: ts or imprison strikers when the strike inflicts distress on others the better for us all.

“We nothing extenuate, nor aught set down in malice.”