CAPITAL AND LABOUR.

Taihape Daily Times, 4 September 1919, Page 6

CAPITAL AND LABOUR.

SUGGESTED CONFERENCE. ‘ ATTITUDE OF EMPLOYERS. NATIONALISATION ISSUE. CHRISTCHURCH, Sept. 1. Speaking at the annual meeting of the Canterbury Employers’ Association, Ml'“Williani Pryor, secretary of the New Zealand Employers.’ Federation, referred to the strong pressure bi-o'ught'to bear on the federation during the past eighteen months to be a party to a scheme for a. Dominion conference between Capital and Labour. The Advisory Board, Mr Pryor said, felt it_- incumbent on- it not to agree to the scheme as ‘proposed. In the fii-st place it felt that the time had not come when such a conference could be procluctive of much good. Secondly-, and more -important, perhaps, it wasifelt that with the extremists in control of the Labour unions it would be worse than useless to agree 1 to such a conference_ "There we;-ml such men in control to—day———personal- _ ly he thought it was only a. passing phase-—and he believed that before V long the great body of the Workers" of the Dominion would say that these men with extreme I.VV.W. if not'B'ol-"C" ahevik views Were not the men_ to re-_' present their ‘views. It Wpuld be ‘ arworsethan foolish to meet a "body o-_f_ ‘' men who had stated definitely and ab! solutely that they were going to kill _ the employer and Wipe -him out of ex? ‘ istence. ' ‘ ' ’ ‘tic’. ence Were to be held, they must know I thefibasis of. discussion and the points to .be_ discussed. If, for instance,-”~" they were to discuss nothing beyond’--‘ an increase of wages and the shorteni 4 ing of hours, then those connected’? with the secondary industries of" the Dominion said they had gone as far almost as they could in those direcé tions if the industries were to live at.‘ all. Personally; he ‘thought that they!" -‘sbegan at the wrong end if they talk? edabout leaders of Labour unionsand ' employers’ associationsik What he 1 would urge and what he had been rurging was closer relationship be- ; tween the indiviciml employer and his !‘ ‘own employeesv. They should nlal€é'if'i their business to get among their own men and Line ‘out those with‘ xi-‘noixi I they could discuss matters intelligently, ‘and by that nieans th_ey_ lllighti evolve some scheme by which they might engender more interest on the part of the workers in the result of Work_ From that they could go onto a distric.t conference and then to" a “national conference they would l{get;.that class of representativcl to” jwhich he had re_ferred. ' Thus good might be done. It could not be done ‘ otherwise. ' I

Speaking on the subject of nationalisation, Mr Pryor said a number of people, who, generally. speaking, were‘ not in favour of nationalisation, seemed to think at the present time_, because there was an idea that something must be done, that it did not matter what was clone so’ long as‘ something was done. Employers of labour spoke in favour of nationalising this or that so long as their own industry was not nationalised. but as-‘ suming, say, that the coal mines were nationalised, it would not be long before four or five other trades. Wére nationalised, including the freezing works, and, probably, the sawmills. There had been a suggestion that the medical service of the Dominion should be nationalised. In Wel lington they had’ experience of a municipal milk supply.

The point he desired to make was‘ that if everything was under the con. trol of the State it would not be in the best interests of the country. It would mean that the man with the best political pull was going to get the best out of it. Then, assuming that the freezing works were nationalised,’ how long would it be Before they would have land nationalisation? That. was :<urely the last thing that the farmer wanted_ Yet farmcl:s,;’ unions——tlle Hamilton Farmers’ UllT('sn,. for .instance——called on the Government to nationalisc the coal mines, little realising that the nationalisation of the coal mines was but one step towards the nationalising of the 'la_.ntl_,. and ultimate control by the unioll_s of all our industries. ' If capitalistic control had not been successful, he feared very much that complete union control would he very much _less. successful——it would be a very much n_lore autocratic control than any that,l=ad been experienced in this country.