UNION NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 453, 20 March 1909, Page 3

UNION NOTES.

[This eolunm is edited by the Flaxmills Employees' Union Executive. All matters for publication under this head must bo forwarded to the Secretary of the Union.!

; To the members of the ManaWatu Flaxmill Employees’ Industrial Union of workers: —

For some time past it has been a matter of extreme concern to your committee that they were unable to find means of a weekly communication to all your subbranches, and the idea had been considered of a weekly circular. Arrangements have now been made with the editor of this journal for the insertion of one column per week for Union notes, and the present writing is the first of a weekly series. We do not think that the introductory article can be made to serve a belter purpose than to bring our members in the outlying mills up-to-date with the happenings since our deputation waited upon Mr Hogg, a detailed report of which has been posted to the delegate at your mill. THE ASSOCIATION’S REPLY. Three members of the Association (Messrs Greig, Mabin and Toogood) took exception, through the medium of the Dominion, to our figuies taken from I lie books Of a miller showing the weekly output at his mill to be 8 tons of dry fibre*- In reply to their objections we offered to lake Mr Mabin to the mill, let him see the leaf milled and forfeit £5 to the Palmerston-Hospital if we did not prove our point. Mr Greig, by the simple expedient of adding the two words ‘‘good fair” to our statement, converted it into practically an impossibility and offered to forfeit £25 if we could produce this miller who was achieving the impossible. We cried “check” to Mr Greig by pointing out that good fair was never mentioned, and by offering to put a team of men into one of his Foxton mills and show him how to turn out the quantity in dispute. But this gentleman did not see that any good end would be served by his accepting our challenge, and so, for the present the matter rests. We commend to our members consideration this fact, that we are credibly informed that the three gentlemen mentioned above are all members of a syndicate which bought flax lands at speculative prices. And that it is with a view to bettering their admittedly bad bargain that Mr Greig makes such a point of “complete revision of the award*” THE ROYALTY OWNERS.

Needless to say the action of your deputation was the cause of much adverse comment on the part of owners pf green leaf, but whilst they were not slow in levying charges of “ inaccuracy,” “misrepresentation” and so forth, in no single instance did any of them succeed in sheeting their charges home. Nay, more ; Messrs Stevens, Kaston and Austin proceeded to justify their existence by publishing the scale on which Moutoa leaf is milled. It makes very interesting reading to anyone engaged in the industry. If the London market advances ,£lO, the Moutoa Estate takes ,£8 is 6d in increased royalty, and leaves the miller £1 18s 6d to allow for a possible rise in wages! There was also an acrimonious personal attack upon your Secretary penned by Mr Hugh Akers, which your committee nuelified by a letter signed by its members.

A DEMAND FOR REVISION. We have been the recipients of a letter from the Clerk of Awards in Wellington, notifying us that the Association has applied for a revision of the existing Award. Clause 56 of the new act provides that the application must be on the part of a substantial number on both sides, so that the application of the Association alone would appear to be useless. In this connection we would call your special attention to the fact that the only Foxton miller whose name appears on the application is Mr H. Greig. If all these other millers, working under, the disadvantages which admittedly fexist, can yet do so without a’ revision it will naturally be asked why the others cannot do so.

GET INTO TINE. Yet another argument in favour of Unionism (if indeed any be necessary) is furnished by the utterances of the President of the Arbitration Court, Mr Justice Sim, reported in the daily press of the 17th instant. He said, during the bearing of one case, that he was unable to understand why an employer should “ bother with nonunion jsts.” His Honor then proceeded to define the position held by non-unionists. “They want the benefits of the Awards without sharing any of the burden. It is mere meanness, there is no principle in it at all.” To all of which your Committee says “Amen” most heartily, It is the parasitical class alluded to above that is the greatest stumbling block to Union organisers. Reaping, not only where they have not sown but where they have attempted to iinder others from sowing, they merit to the full, the severe strictures passed upon them by the head of the Arbitration Coqrt.