The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1920. THE CRIME AGAINST LABOUR.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XII, Issue 3613, 28 October 1920, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE.

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1920. THE CRIME AGAINST LABOUR.

With which is incorporated '

“The Taihape Post and Waimarino

News,”

I In Britain, the Council of Action is S as dead as a doornail, and not a friend I is left to* give it decent burial. Be- | ports of a very mixed character have | been reaching New Zealand during the | past three months, and from them it seemed that anything might happen, even to a few self-appointed, ill-in-formed ambitious so-called worker? calling out on strike every member of a labour union in the triune country. The total membership of workers’ unions was to form a Bed Army, march to Parliament, bottle up Ministers and put Mr Lloyd George under lock and key to keep him from, mischief while the non-elective Council of Action took possession of the Goveruf ing machinery, scrapped the .good old I British constitution, and put in moI tion the well-understood methods of S compelling public respect and adherI ence to fuglemen who were to act in I Britain as Lenin, Trotsky, and ComI pany are yet aetipg in Kussia. There [ is a sad, very sad side to the labour | question; could workers have been f saved from the accursed excrescence of Bolshevism, or Direct Action, the [ very best brains in Britain may, and [ there is most reasonable evidence for . hoping, have been on the side of the people, fighting for the rights of every human being to live in comfort. Direct Action —Sovietism —Bolshevism is defeated, the railwayman of the great ( western metropolis, Liverpool, heralded the news; they unitedly told others to strike if they pleased but they had

shaken the strike dust from their feet. They positively yelled, Down with your Direct Action! Scrap it, to hades with it! We have seen and felt enough of it! Nothing good has come out of it! , We have been' foolishly led! We have allowed a few ambitious, self-appointed fools to tell ns what to do, and we like fools were led astray, but no more, of it. British railwaymen have shown themselves entirely out of sympathy with the orders to strike issued by the non-clect-ed Council of Action. Mr F. tH. Boss, M,P. has told how the great Council came into being; the Parliamentary Labour Party, the Council of the National Labour Party, and the- Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress were summoned by -somebody to assemble in one of the Committee rooms of the House, on 9th August. Mr Boss, as a Labour member was present, and Mr Clynes, M.P., presided on the auspicious occasion. It soon became apparent that many present had cprae with a considered, cut and dried determination to defy all law and order, and, in spite of sound, rational advice by the chairman the birth of British revolution hurriedly took place. It was a pitiably demented looking infant, viewed askance by many, and only applauded by the few, editor Dansbury, of the “ Herald,” being its chief nurse. Born amid distraction, cunning and chicanery, the ,poor thing failed to make healthy and it ■ gradually passed away'from lack of encouragement to live. Direct Action came as a result of a. complete volto face in one important .aspect of the much boasted policy of Labour. Secret diplomacy was not to 'be tolerated in the future; there were to be no State secrets of any kind, everything in eon- i nection with State-craft was to be open and above board, and yet theCouncil of Action was the child of premeditated subtlety and cunning. Of course, New Zealand direct actionists will deny the truth of anything said in this connection, but the chairman of the {very meeting at which it came as rather a surprise, and Mr Boss, M.P., both testify to the complete abandonment of no-secrecy policy ot the party. They both testify that, after the Council of Action was set up all its functions were conducted in mcrecy, and Mr .ißoss leaves no doubt about it for ho plainly stated, “what the Council of Action has done since its inception I know no more than the man in the street. After a day or two Imd messed I ventured to ask one of ”>e Council men a question as to developments, and was told, none too nolite’y. to mind my own business ” Mr Boss. M.P., went on in a mordantly humourous vein to say, “of course, we are still united; it would never do to allow more divergencies of view to destroy the working-class solidarity T-r,.. Token .«o rrfany years and so much effort to achieve.” An act | "" ViemrDge pv nnrasites on the La- j '■'’"’'ernent has sounded the Lankvm. and the real Labour 1

avoid a total wreck. A few sapient

j ...ggorers and adventurers of the j ..uost dangerous type sought to ride to 1 power and fortune on the backs o? j what they mistook for, giant labour i air ties; they were going, willy nilly, | to stop only at the table and in the j chair of Lloyd George; they were out j to challenge the Prime Minister, and Ito scrap the British Constitution. What has this great self-appointed Council of Action accomplished? It ha& opposed British people to the cause of the workers; it has strengthened Lloyd George’s hold upon Government benches to a surprising extent, and if Ms position is later assailed it will be by a party very much less in' 1 sympathy with the masses than the present Prime Minister is undeniably known to be., The greatest joke in Britain to-day is the Council of Action, everybody, but those who are consumed with disgust, are laughing at the bursted Bolshevik bubble, holding it up to ridicule and contempt. Viewing the Council of Action idea with utmost seriousness, if that is

possible under the circumstances, responsible labour leaders in and out of Parliament have now the stern tact before them that, “instantly the Council of Action came mysteriously into being, it acquired all the vices of sectret diplomacy, it. sat within closed doors, and told the public as much as it wanted the public to know.V The fluttering of its red rags invites ridicule, and few there are who notice them except as something to laugh and jest about. The Council of Action has not come up to anticipations, being feared most by those who assisted at its birth. It is proving more harmful than many of its sponsors 1 thought it could become and it. is now becoming a thing of the past. What is happening to the New Zealand

Council of Action that was reported to be in readiness for a grand coup « few months back. If it is still in existence its members have exactingly struck out of its policy every idea . favouring publicity; whatever is being done it is behind closed doors, and nothing has yet developed that the people of New Zealand could safely be trusted with. It was stated with bated breath that Soviets were appointed in the larger provincial towns, but where are they? Were some labour people romancing, or did Soviet members become ashamed of the ineffably silly part they were playing. The Council of Action in this Dominion has been as successful in placing Mr Massey in an unehallengable position of political power, just as the British Council of Action has rendered Mr Lloyd George's position unassailable. It is as well that ali workers should bear in mind a, principle that affects their vital interests, which is, that whatever lessening there may be of production, whether it be ,of wool or tin-tacks labour is always going to be the first and greatest sufferer thereby. The exigency of war conditions has rendered it expedient to doctor up industrial principles with political pills and potions t-that are likely, if not certain, to leave the industrial patient in a much worse condition of health tl»an he at present enjoys, and we hope that interested workers will note this and remember it when darker labour days begin to dawn. We have pointed out that the over-hearing attitude of commercialism is forcing workers into the ranks of the wild men of labour, let us state now that the wild men of labour are forcing every individual in business, or having a share in any business concern, every farmer and owner of transport, into the ranks of capitalism. Instead of Councils of Action winning something for labour they have built up a phalanx of determined business and moneyed people, ready to wage successful warfare with labour any minute occasion is invited. Those men who have given their wuole lives to bettering the conditions of the masses are regretfully conscious oT the entrapment of labour in the Boi' shevik not, for they know that the work of a lifetime has been lost