THE H.B. TRIBUNE SATURDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1927 TRADE UNIONISM’S RESPONSIBILITIES

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, 10 December 1927, Page 4

THE H.B. TRIBUNE SATURDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1927 TRADE UNIONISM’S RESPONSIBILITIES

yyHEN first the determination of Australian watersiders to strike was announced we had word of some sort of mild protest being entered by the Australian and New Zealand Council of Trade Unions because kindred unions whose members were likely to be adversely affected had not been consulted. To this protest the watersiders lent entirely deaf ear, proceeding to carry out their decision without regard to the losses that would inevitably be incurred by their fellow workers. It would appear, however, from one of yesterday’s messages that this feature of the strike is not to be passed over without some further discussion. We are told that the Sydney Labour Council is to be asked “to convene a conference of transport unions with a view to obviating independent strikes.’ This is cer tainly something to the good, since the establishment of some such right of consultation could scarcely but have the effect of making strikes among the transport services less frequent. At the same time, it cannot but be noted that the purpose behind this movement to assert the right of fellrv unionists directly affected to have their interests considered proceed; on altogether too narrow lines. In the first place, it is very obvious that the watersiders’ strike must necessarily affect very intimately and almost immediately many trade unionists outside the transport ranks, the .miners furnishing perhaps the most noteworthy instance of this. Why, then, even from the purely, trade-unionist

point of view, should not these also be consulted! But beyond this again is still the fact that the whole body of trade union members, with their dependents, were likely to be affected, if by nothing else then by the assured prospect that the company losses involved would eventually be passed on to the public of which they form a very substantial proportion.

This naturally brings us to the point of suggesting that there is a duty cast on trade unionism to give some thought to the interests of the community as a whole. It is, in the end, that community which provides the means for paying every trade unionist his or her wages, and every time there is a serious dislocation of industry or the services to industry the capacity for providing those means is reduced. Surely, this is a good reason why those who are assigned the office of guiding the activities of trade unionism as a whole should study, if only with regard for the interests of their own organisations, what effect a strike is going to have upon the general capacity to furnish good wages. Beyond this, again, is the aspect upon which we have previously touched. That is as to why the leaders of the trade union movement seem to have so little thought for the need to insist upon every union showing respect for the awards of the Arbitration Court, from which trades unionists as a body have derived so manybenefits. In the particular case under notice there had been undoubted, indeed quite notorious violations by the men of the award supposed to govern the conditions of their employment. In fact, it was to these, and to nothing else, that the hold-up of the whole of Australia’s shipping was due. Yet we hear nothing of any protest from the central executive of the trade union body with regard to this. Trade unionism has secured very many privileges for itself, after many years of a struggle that has brought but scant gratitude to its early fighters from those now enjoying the fruits of what maybe termed victory. But those privileges imply also corresponding duties and responsibilities to .tlie public to see that the principle, upon which they are based should be held inviolate. So far, however, these duties and responsibilities would seem to have occasioned trade union leaders in Australia and, for that matter, in this country, too, but very little con cern. In the Old Country, where the trade union movement originated, and where its weaknesses are beginning to be recognised by its leaders of to-day, they are at this present moment having the very fullest consideration — an example that is well worthy of being followed.