UNITED LABOUR PARTY.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 539, 5 February 1913, Page 6

UNITED LABOUR PARTY.

CONDUCTED BY THE DOMINION EXECUTIVE COUNCIL. (The Easter. Conference of the United Labour Party voted to make no paper its special organ, but to provide official news and comments to any paper promising to regularly publian the same. The paper is not responsible for this column, and the party assumes no responsibility for any utterances of the paper except for its own official utterances in - this department.) THE RECENT CONFERENCE OF TRADES UNIONISTS. ITS PROBLEMS AND THEIR SOLUTION. ' Bv Walter Thomas Mills. It is more that three years since a lecture tour wag entered upon which included a visit to New Zealand It is more than two yenrs since correspondence was opened and the definite study of the situation here undertaken, and 1 have been nearly two years in the country. The one fact which was written to me about most frequently, and which most urgently forced itself on my attention on my arrival was the great loss to the Labour movement because of factional controversies: It was believed by many—iC seemed entirely evident to me — thai the time was ripe for a union of force.

THE UNITY CAMPAIGN. The events have proved that the Unity Campaign was premature, but tbe events have also proved that the times now are ripe and overripe for the consummation of unity. Here are so.; e items involving a frank statement in some instances of a change in my views on matters as they appear to ma to day, and as they did appear to me eighteen months ago. Then I felt that the confusion, waste of time, and the expense of duplicating the machinery of dua! organisations largely on- the same fields could be avoided in New Zealand by uniting in a single natioal body both industrial and political activities.

I was aware that this had not been undertaken successfully anywhere else. I think, however, that ail students of political institutions cf are of opinion that it ia only a matter of time when industrial organisations, following the lines of industrial development, will become the great political units and in fact assume the functions of governmani, end that then, without question, no hard and

fast lines can be drawn between industrial and political activities. It had seemed to me that something approaching such an ideal form of organisation was already possible in New Zeaalnd, provided industrial disputes were confined in their management to branches of the national organisations dealing with

industrial matters only. I.—SEPARATE ORGANISATION The difficulties have been twofold. 1. While the position is perfectly

logical it is practically impossible to

make it understood. 2. The industrial organisations themselves, I am convinced, must be more completely organised along the lines of the industries before the industrial unit can make itself effective or will be tempted to do so in the field of politics. Anyway lam confident that it ia the judgment of the overwhelming majority of those who have been working with' me iu the- United Labour party that the the easiest way to secure the co operation of all the workers in both fields is to consentto their organisation in separate national bodies. 11. There has been a good deal of dispute over ihe question of aroitration and the strike policy, and there has been the feeling that two distinct industrial groups were being developed along the lines of conflicting policies in this matter. Eighteen months ago. whatever the facts might have been—the impression at least wasjabroad everywhere, and that impression so deep and forceful that it had great influence on the public thought of this country—that opposing movements were being developed on the opposite sides of this quea tion of arbitration.

During the months wh : ch have passed some old facts have been widely studied and some recent events have given a new demonstration of well-established principles, and this Wellington conference reveals the real truth that whatever may have been true in the past, it ib now true that there is no considerable body of trade unionists in New Zealand who would take either side in a direct controversy either for or against either arbitration or strikes except the character of the strikes to be undertaken and the nature of the arbitration to be established Ehoud be first clearly defined.

The varying conditions of the trades make hard and fast rules on either of these topics practically impossible of construction, but the feeling expressed in the conference and written into its finding and recommendations leaves the unions in the various industries to determine, in consideration of the peculiar conditions of their own industries, what shall be undertaken in the matter of registration and in the management of industrial disputes, while in every case provision shall be made for carrying industrial controversies, should occasion arise, to a central national body with authority to act, supported by the joint strength of all the industries of New Zelaand. For one hundred centuries men. have fought for the right not to work except upon their own choice to do so. It is not likely that this right secured at such cost is going to be .grrven up under any acheme of arbitration which can possibly be devised. On the other hand, just as Labour Mpes power in the State and be- | responsible for the management

of public affairs, it is frankly ad mitted that it must provide other means for adjusting industrial con troversies than the costly and painful method of industrial insurrection

Again, while this is insisted upon by the friends of arbitration, nothing is more marked than the absolute unanimity of conviction among all the workers, those in the United Labour party as well as all the rest, that Labour must not be committed to a scneme of arbitration which under the control of a reactionary Government may be made itself the instrument of industrial oppression, and provide it self the machinery for disruption and destruction of regularly constituted Labour organisations.