THE HEMP MARKET.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 1097, 17 September 1912, Page 3

THE HEMP MARKET.

HIGH COMMISSIONER RE-

PORT,

The High Commissioner cabled as follows at noon yesterday : The hemp market is firm at advance. Reports from Manila indicate high prices in ai.-oau deliveries. Spot good fait, .{.e; ius; fair, ; forward sL, - t same ,;.ice. Manila spft. 10s; l.irrarc A . The . .-.tpu'. from Manila for the wt:.k was 28,000 _ne above pr.esare an advance ;11 those cabled last week h, five shillings per ton for both good iair and fair. fSOEftf.-- ÜBOOft. '■ SMASHING THE INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY.” Speaking at Addington on Friday last, Mr Semple, organiser of the Federation of Labour, said that it had been stated that the Federation was against the men of the Court, but there were loyal members of the federation who were supporters of the Court. It was also true that at Waikino an attempt was being made to remove the term “scab” by the substitution of “arbitrationist.” These men were scabs, and scabs of the worst type, since they were trying to smash the industrial democracy. There were great forces opposed to the democracy : the "Mills mob” and the Government, but the Federation had the men behind it. The response had been wonderful and had surprised the whole country. Already ,£15,000 bad been subscribed to help the men, and that in the middle of winter. The Federation was going on with the contest. The coal miners, who understood the position, were supporting the Federation. They knew what it was to go to the Arbitration Court, only to be met with the sneers of a class-biased Judge. In Waikino the scabs were protected by the bludgeons of the police. No one who resorted to such tactics was a man. “The Federation has surprised the country,” he added, “and if the police are used too much it will surprise the workmen and the country as a whole still more. We are not going down without a fight, and if we do go we will leave a mark on the industrial history of this country.”

Commenting on Mr Semple’s statements the Wellington Post, under the heading of “The Big Bluff,’’ says:—“Mr Semple, organiser for the Red Federation of Labour, is making a desperate flourish with a semblance ot a big stick in an attempt to bluff employers and the public. He points ro contributions of over and talks of a “big surprise” in store for the Waihi Company and employers generally unless the Reds are allowed to win at Waihi. Mr Semple and his friends may persuade themselves that the\ are marching to victory, but they will need to be more clever than they have so tar revealed themselves if they hope to delude the public about the hopeless position of the revolutionary Federation. When it championed the cause ot the affiliated Waihi Miners’ Union in a dispute which had not the sympathy of the general body of Labour in New Zealand, it had no large fighting fund. Since then the Federationists have been paying levies, and yet it is alleged by some of them that they have been saving money to widen the strike zone. It is asserted that the Federationists, after supporting the Waihi men for over four months (with the aid of some subsidies from Australia), have simultaneously been building up reserves for a great battle —a struggle in which they will have to rely on their own resources, because the United Labour Party has decided not to assist the Red Federation. Possibly the unions 01 this Federation (including the coal miners) hope to ‘paralyse the country,’ as one spokesman once boasted, by even a comparatively brief stoppage of work, but we believe that New Zealand will be able to get coal it all the Federationists strike and even if supplies are not available from Australia. Vhe Reds ha ve not only challenged the employers at Waihi to mortal co n hat, they have alb... challenged the public of New Zealand, au.i we are confident that the pubuc will not agree limply to lie under the heel of the noisy dictators. We believe that these clamorous men are vainly trying to bluff the public, If they are reckless enough to call out all Federationists they will merely add to the bitterness of the defeat that is inevitable lor them at Waihi, where the number of Arbitration workers is reported to be steadily increasing, A little inconvenience will be a small price for the public to pay for a set- back to revolutionaries whose tactics are condemned by the leaders of the United Labour Party. If the people allowed themselves to be beaten by the Red Federation they would pay dearly for their surrender to the would-be autocrats.”