FEDERATION OF LABOUR WANT FUNDS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 1055, 11 June 1912, Page 3

FEDERATION OF LABOUR WANT FUNDS.

APPEAL TO FLAXMILLS EMPLOYEES’ UNION.

UNION DEMAND A BALLOT.

A meeting of the Flaxrnill Employees’ Union was held in the Municipal Hall at Palmerston N., on Saturday, at 3 p.m. Mr R. H. Dalhousie, president, occupied the chair, and explained that the meeting vv s called for the purpose of considering the question'of a levy on behalf of the locked-out miners at Reefton and Waihi.

Mr P. Hickey then addressed the meeting and outlined the position existing in the two places. He was followed by Mr J, B. King, ot Auckland, who dealt with the question from the Federation point of view.

Both delegates were accorded an attentive hearing. Considerable difference of opinion was expressed, and there was a tendency to regard the Federation of Labour as forgetting that there were others than miners in it. The levy had already been made by the Federation ou all affiliated bodies without reference to them. A considerable number at the meeting had little sympathy with the Waihi strikers, and were more disposed towards the Reefton strikers. As uo decision could be come to it was decided to take a ballot of the Union members ou the subject.

From what we can gather the majority ot men engaged in the flaxmilling industry would never have consented to the Union affiliating with the Federation of Labour, bad they knowu as much as they do now concerning the extremes of this anarchial body and its blatant leaders. They have learned a good deal since they sought shelter under the Federation's wing. This was the selfsane Federation that boosted Mr John Robertson prior to the election, but the member for Otaki has since joined the more reasonable and rival labour body, uamely the New Zealand Labour Party. We should not be surprised if, in the near future, the Flaxmills Employees’ Uuion severs its allegiance from the Federation.

Commenting on the meeting held at Palmerston on Saturday, the Times says : “We had the Waihi strike brought to Palmerston on Saturday by the meeting of the Flaxmills Employees’ Union to consider the levy of ten per centum in favour of the strike fund. The flaxworkers, like the dairy factory workerSi having united themselves to the egregious Federation of Labour, had willy nilly to pay two shillings out of every pound they earned whenever the tin pot tyrants at the head of the organisation ihoughi that the;, were not sufficiently in the lime-' light, and called out their dupes at Waihi or elsewhere. But though they have to pay this automatically, the flax workers on Saturday, when faced with the formal proposition, didn’t display any enthusiasm for it, even though the redoubtable Mr Hickey came up from Wellington, and a delegate came from Auckland to harangue them on the subject. It was a meeting lively in places, and it wouldn’t adopt the levy, but required it to be put to the ballot. Why a Union in this district should have to contribute one out of every ten shillings which they earn for a right which should never have been put up, which is dead against fellow unionists, which was absolutely wanton, and of which there are signs that those most concerned are already heartily sick, is one ot those things that are as difficult to comprehend as that sensible men would let the Federation leaders make such fools of them. As will be seen by our account of the meeting at Waihi to-day the awakening has already begun there, but as at Brisbane the “leaders” still try to hearten their dupes by shouting victory, while in their hearts they know that they must soon engage in what is euphemistically called in military circles “a strategic movement to the rear.”

To the Feu iatiou Labourite the raau who woi-.s with his hands, particularly the unskilled labourer, is the victim ot oppression. He can’t see that the clerk, the shopkeeper, the mine manager, and mostly everyone is a worker, and he can’t see the State for people. Because the men employed in State coal mines don’t receive more money than those employed in privately owned mines, it is said that the working class gets no benefit, forgetting that the State mines were largely responsible tor keeping the price of coal within reasonable limits and benefiting all classes in that way. Unlike Socialists who believe in providing for the welfare of every person in the community (with a multitude of theories as to how it is to be done), the Federationist believes that there is only one class worthy of consideration, to which all things should come, and. that is the manual labouring class. The Federation Labourist doesn’t believe in class distinctions, and yet bis object is distinctly to create a privileged class. The altruistic doctrines ol Socialism ot which Syndicalism is a misbegotten child preached a sort ol self-sacrifice for the State, for the general good. The Syndicalist dogma says that the prosperity ol the world shall be sacrificed to place the "exploited’’ labourer in the seals of the mighty so that he can wax fat on exploiting others. According to his own logic, it is the same card upside down. —N.Z. Observer.