POLICE AT WAIHI.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 1131, 9 August 1913, Page 4

POLICE AT WAIHI.

BEHAVIOUR DURING STRIKE.

COMMISSIONER’S PRAISE

The Commissioner of Police (Mr John Cullen), in the police report presented to Parliament, makes some references to the strike at Waihi last year. “ During the year,” he says, “ a strike took place among the men employed in the gold mining industry at Waihi and Waikino, which necessitated over 80 members of the police force being drafted there from various parts of the Dominion to protect life and property, and keep order between the striker and free labourers who came to fill the places vacated by the former. The police during the five or six months they were on special duty at Waihi had to perform very harassing duty, and were subjected to gross insults and abuse from strikers and their womenfolk ; yet notwithstanding the irksome duties the men had to perform, and the abuse and insults levelled at them, not a solitary case of misconduct was reported against any member of the force. The tact and forbearance exercised by the police enabled them at all times to maintain a complete mastery of the situation at Waihi, and I have no hesitation in stating that they proved themselves to be a body of men that the Dominion should be proud of. “Owing to a strike having occurred among the coalminers at Huntly, a detachment of police bad to be sent there also for a few weeks, but as very little disturbance took place, and the men returned to work, the police were soon withdrawn.”