WELLINGTON STRIKE

Hokitika Guardian, 10 May 1932, Page 5

WELLINGTON STRIKE

MEN STOP WORK

AGAINST NEW RELIEF RATES

L iiy Telegraph, Per Press Association

WELLINGTON, May 9,

Four or five gangs of relief worker,.; leit tucir jobs to-day as a protest again, -a the new scale of relict work-

i iiis afternoon 'several hundred men met at the Basin Reserve, and they decided to strike.

A number of the police were present’ and Commissioner Woliiinann also paid a visit.

There were several speakers, most of whom suggested the formation; of a Relief Workers’ Union independent of the Relief Workers’ Section* of the General Labourers’ Union, and also of the Unemployed Workers’ Movement, which, one speaker claimed, was out to camouflage for the Communist Party. No finality was reached upon this point, but a large majority'declared in favour of a strike. A Committee of Action was set up to meet in the Trades Hall this evening to consider ways and means and to report to a meeting to he held in the Basin Reserve at 9 o’clock to-mor-row morning.

A deputation had gone to interview the Prime Minister and the Minister of Unemployment, and the meeting nwaited its report. It was later stated that the representatives had been unable to see either Mr Forbes or Mr Coates, but that Air Semple had arranged a deputation to the Unemployment Beard, and that the result Would be announced at to-morrow morning’s meeting.

The unemployed ■'decision was to strike against the payment of rent and of the levy, as a protest against the new relief work scale. The decision was not one to strike against work.