The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE THURSDAY, MARCH 20th, 1919. THE GRAVEST DANGER.

Taihape Daily Times, 20 March 1919, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

THURSDAY, MARCH 20th, 1919. THE GRAVEST DANGER.

(With wttich Is Incorporated The Tai« hape Post t-nd Watajailno Newß).

There is no question at this moment that commences to compare in gravity with that of industrial reconstruction. Specked viperously with anarchy of the Bolshevik character, Labour is in grave danger of taking to itself a taste of what is now being experienced in Russia, which Russian Labour is compelled to swallow, however bitter the dose, or however much it forces them to deeds of horrifying fracticide. While Labour here remains quiescent, waiting for the promises of the Government to materialise, what are employers and capitalists doing to save the country and their industries from almost summary destruction?, In face of the fact that is emblazoned right across the heavens, telling of the changes in Labour's life and opportunities that must come whether employers will them or not, not one effort is made, not one demand towards that end is freely conceded; Labour is being fought inch by inch to free itself of that curse, the fear of unemployment, with its resultant starvation of wives and children. We know how bitter and unpalatable the very mention of the question is to many conservative-minded people, but what must be leaves foreseeing people no choice. It is said, probably "with, some truth, that Labour in this Dominion is watching the trend of Labour in Britain being rattu:r prepared to settle matters on lines similar to those agreed upon at Home than to convulse industry here unnecessarily. Arc employers doing anything towards

preserving industrial peace beyond zealously guarding and maintaining the old industrial regime? Taxpayers are being asked to subsidise flcurniillers some sixty shillings per ton on all the flour they make because the costs of carting, sacks, and wheat have increased; why not subsidise the worker because bread and everything else whereby he and his family must live have gone up in price? Surely a case involving starvation is of far more vital import than the millers' increase of profits, and yet this is only a sample of what is taking place in every branch of industry. The Board of Trade and the Government have realised the danger to the whole body politic of permitting profiteering that would increase the cost of living, and they have found a way of making the people submit to profiteering by recommending a State subsidy in place of labour-squeezing or price-raising, of bribing flourmillers not to precipitate revolution by casting upon long-suffering Labour the last straw. We say that it would be cause for marvel if Labour did not provide easy victims to Seinpleism; did not flock to the banners of Bolshevism, to whence they are being drawn by insane greed, and to where they are being beckoned by self-pro-claimed followers of Lenin and Trotsky. Labour is toeing both pulled and pushed into the revolutionary state

in this Dominion, and were it not for the fact that a general election is near at hand some living examples of the curse of greed would reap all the trouble they continue to invite. If tlourmillers cannot produce flour at a price the wages they pay Labour will buy, that industry has reached a crisis similar to that reached in coalmining in the Old Country, and instead of taxpayers being robbed to bribe millers, the industry should be nationalised. If the State is to subsidise any industry they should first be made State industries. The British Cabinet and Parliament have come to this con 2 elusion from the noisome err-oricuce

gained of subsidisation. Britain set up a Joint Committee of Employers and Employees, and Lloyd George wont all thjv way from Paris to London to impress upon he Committee some very vital truths. He told them they wore sitting at a Peace Con-1 ference more important for the ; future than they realised. It might b i that Britain would again he called upon to save civilisation in more ways than one. -Russia had gone lo pieces, Germany was also going to pieces, and it was for that committee tio set up a model of civilisation for the rest of the world. He urgod upon them the da tigers of trying to get advantages over each other; let employers approach Labour in a spirit of justice, or civilisation might be shattered to atoms. It cohld only be saved by the triumph of justice and fair play. It was a mistake to keep men working 'longer than neces--1 sary. Lloyd George pointed out that j while unemployment only, meant loss I of profits to employers, to the worker ' it meant personal suffering and the greater sorrow of seeing his family starving. Only those who had lived with the working classes could understand these horrors, which must be , banished for ever. What employers (in New Zealand will not s<v is that increasing productivity only can keep up a tolerable prosperity. Employers and employed are urged to exchange views, to have a "quiet talk, and to

devise an understanding; it was essential that sunshine should enter the worker's cottage as well as the employer's mansion if productivity was to increase 'and civilisation was to be rendered safe. While New Zealand employers still persist upon settling great issues on their own deliberation and vote, refusing to meet the other party to the bargain, even His Majesty the King is giving laudience to •Labour in Britain. A member for Labour told the King that old employees should" 6"e w entitled to enter the Board room to discuss grievances with Directors. While the King finds it in the interests of civilisation to confer with and listen to Labour, lenemies of civilisation in this Dominion refuse to meet their employees in discussion of subjects vitial to the saving of civilisation. Greed has blinded many and is continuing, to blind the controllers of industry in New Zealand to what they are threatening civilisation with. We stand not for one side

against the other only in so far as we are constrained by vital necessities that arc recognised by all leading statesmen of the world, who are mostly employers. Near the close of the war we were accused of extreme | optimism; on the brink of an iri'O- , trievable rupture between capital and | labour we shall be termed hopeless pessimists by blind greed that is following a course in New Zealand which Lloyd George is beseeching employers to abandon and banish in the Homeland. N Labour here is not so ignorant that it fails to see that subsidisation of industries is adding to the curse of indirect taxation the masses have to provide; that with protective duties and subsidies employers are receiving State aid which meets all the taxation they are called upon to pay, and builds up such profits as to make a fair distribution utterly impossible. It is the old aristocratic feudal trick .to shift he cost of State administration from off their shoulders on to the shoulders of the masses; but such tricks cannot be safely practised to-day. The British Government and British employers are endeavouring to do what is required to save civilisation; will the New Zealand Government and New Zealand employers ask themselves what they arc doing to stem the tide of anarchy and revolution that is sweeping ovier the world, and to establish in its place industrial peace, justice, and conI tentment?