Ravages of Miners' Complaint.

Maoriland Worker, Volume 2, Issue 69, 5 July 1912, Page 15

Ravages of Miners' Complaint.

SOUTH AFRICAN LADY SPEAKS

During the course of a lecture in Johannesburg, South Africa, Mrs. M. Fitzgerald gave a graphic illustration of the ravages of miners' complaint on tho Rand.

During the eight years she was acting as typist to the Miners' Union (says the South Africa- "Voice of Labor") she was three times photographed with groups of tlie various executives, making in all HG miners whose portraits were taken in the prime of youth and strength. Of the 36, four wero now alive. She told how she had stood by the death beds of Sflnno of those men; had watched their agonies as they struggled for breath : and had hoard them curse the capitalist system and the rapacity of the mine-own-ers who forced such underground conditions on their workers. Seven years was the average life of a miner underground.

If those Rand miners had refused to work under the awful conditions that murdered men in seven years, tlie Mine-owners' Association, Employers' Federation, the daily press and possibly cheap jack professors would have united in one long, weird screech of condemnation.

As it is in Africa, so is ib ia New Zealantf.