THE Kaipara Advertiser, AND WAITEMATA CHRONICLE. WEDNESDAY, MAY 29, 1912.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 29 May 1912, Page 2

THE Kaipara Advertiser, AND WAITEMATA CHRONICLE. WEDNESDAY, MAY 29, 1912.

STRIKES AND STRIKERS

It will be remembered by manypeople throughout the Dominion that when the General Election of 1908 eventuated, Waihi voted No-license. Subsequently, a well known Divine —at one time Presbyterian Minister of the township in question, namely, the Rev. Mr Patullo —stated that he considered the result of the Ohinemuri Licensing Poll was simply due to " pure divilment" on the part of the miners. In retrospect, we are now of opinion that a similar term might be justly applied relative to the present strike in the goldfields. Again, during the month of May of the year to which we have already referred, a serious disturbance was then, pending—the men's demands being in respect of the co-operative system with regard to contracts. It was at this period that one of the largest meetings ever held in the great mining centre which we have under review, took place. On that occasion several rabid agitators strongly advised the men to show their " backbones " as their forefathers had done before them, and so forth. In reply, Mr H. P. Barry (Superintendent of the Waihi Company) declared, with dramatic effect, that if those concerned went out on strike he had authority to flood the mine ! This terrible threat, founded as it was on a sure basis from head quarters, had the desired outcome of bringing the more obstreperous to their senses, and shortly after a satisfactory agreement was arranged. But, the tense situation at the present moment is of an entirely different order altogether. In brief, the present strike arose anent a demand being made upon the companies—viz., the Waihi G. M. Co., and Waihi Grand Junction Co. —that they should compel the engine drivers employed by them to become members of the Miners' Union. The latter, it may be remarked, recently cancelled their registration under the Arbitration Act, and joined the notorious New Zealand Federation of Labour, while the engine drivers elected to remain beneath the banner of the said Act. Further, the mining companies intimated that the dispute was one in which they could not interfere, and immediately a general strike was declared. This is the whole position in a nutshell, and it does not say much for the intelligence of the Miners' Union officials when they assume so unreasonable and dastardly an attitude. To be candid, the New Zealand Federation of Labour, which is making nothing more or less than a circus of itself, is an over-advertised tenthrate display of crass ignorance and inadequacy! Whereas, the Arbitration Court is, we think, the acme of perfection as a medium through which even vital disputes can be settled with impunity. On the other hand, a certain degree of sympathy should always be extended to the toilers who earn their bread, by the sweat of their brow ; but it does not essentially follow that1 this course is justifiable when for a mere quibble an entire "community is paralysed. We feel inclined to assert that if the " Federation " be determined to continue on their evil ways and reveal such hair-brained revolutionary characteristics in defiance of the Law, then it bids fair to grow into an infernal institution that has been constituted to upset, whenever opportunity occurs, the whole machinery of this Dominion from end to end.