LABOUR IN POLITICS.

Maoriland Worker, Volume I, Issue 7, 20 March 1911, Page 19

LABOUR IN POLITICS.

Dear "Worker," —I read with Seen interest the articles in the November issue by Messrs Hickey and Dowgray. I heartily endorse the aims and objects of the N.Z. Federation of Labour, and I hope to see the workers of N.Z. welded into ono compact body, for in unity there is strength and in division disaster. But if this is true in the industrial field it is equally so in the political arena. Political organisation is the logical complement of industrial Unity—the one is useless without the other. To deny this is to α-eprive the workers of a most powerful weapon and leave them at the mercy of the designing politicians of Ward's and Massey's parties, who are owned body and soul by the capitalist and land monopolist class. It is true certain Labour leaders ignore the importance of industrial solidarity by clinging to obsolete methods of sectional Craft Unionism, but if the N.Z. Federation or JLabour persists in at attitude antagonistic to political action they will be perpetrating an equally criminal blunder. 1 state this in all kindness, because I am convinced that harmony and mutual trust, and a broad spirit of tolerxtion is the one thing most desirable in the Labour movement. I therefore hope that conciliation will prevail and that petty jealousies will be banished from our Councils. To this end 1 suggest the amalgamation or the N.Zi. Federation organised by Mr. Semple with the body formed by Mr. McLaren. Overtures should be made to accomplish this as speedily as possible. As to Mr. Dowgray's criticisms of the British and Federal Labour Parties, I would remind him that these parties ar© yet in their infancy. Forty members in an assembly composed of 670. most of which represent vested interests, cannot be expected to build the temple in a day, but that the Independent Labour Party has justified its existence by the results , obtained cannot be denied. The reversal of the Taff Vale decision and the Lloyd George budget were wrung from the Liberals by the presence of the earnest men o* the Labour Party. Who can question the integrity of men like Keir Hardie, Ramsay Macdonald, and Philip Snowden? As to the Australian Labour Party, Mr. Fisher has not been in power long enough to judge by results, but the Federal Land Tax and the State Note Issue are steps in the right direction. Considering the magnitude of the task Mr. Fisher has in hand he has done very well indeed. As evidence of the absolute honesty of the Federal Labour Party I need only quote from Mr. Charles E. Russell's book, "Soldiers of the Commonweal," the fact that they were offered a very large sum of money to vote against the deportation of Kanakas, and every man of them refused. How many members of Liberal and so-called Reform parties would do likewise? Keir Hardie, the Grand Old Man of Socialism, has battled single-handed against battalions of monopoly in the House of Commons. The same thing will require to be done here. Even when the N.Z. Federation of Labour has accomplished its mission; when Industrial Unionism is a trium-

phant fact; when every toiler in N.Z. is a member of a great and all-embrac-ing Confederation of Labour, skilled or unskilled; even then I maintain the means of redemption lies in political action ; for the natural resources, the primal heritage of the workers, is now the private personal property of an idle parasite class who toil not, neither do they spin; and the pathway to the recovery of these natural rights leads into Parliament House. As to Mr. Bemple's fear of political ielly fishes swamping the Labour Party, effective safeguards can be provided against this. There is no reason to doubt that the_leaders as well as the rank and file of tne Labour Party are sound and true, but if traitors are discovered among us let them be promptly weeded out of the movement. The greatest service that the leaders of the N.Z. Feueration of Labour can confer on the working classes is to assist in making the Labour Party the powerful and united force it ought to be. —I am, etc. FRANK W. BURKE.