TROUBLE IN THE TIMBER INDUSTRY.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XII, Issue 3653, 15 December 1920, Page 4

TROUBLE IN THE TIMBER INDUSTRY.

OXE BIG UNION AGITATION, j TEE METHODS OF THE SYNDICALISTS, - jp Wc learn that the employees of' the Egmont Box Company’s Mill at Ohutu have ceased work. This action* being taken against the strong advice o; the Union’s- executive. That is but one mark, of the trouble brewing in the Saw Milling and Timber Trade owing to the violent agitation of a set of Syndicalist cla*a conscious advocates. We say “class conscious” but might fairly say class mad. The idea of these industrial would-be)-dictators is explained in this week’s issue of the Maoriland Worker. It is to have all workers enrolled in the “New Zealand Workers’. Union” which is affiliated to the “ Australian Workers’ Union” and so have "One Big Union of Australasia.” This Union i/s to he on the basis of class and not of occupation. Prom there/it will be' only one or two steps to the “dictatorship of- the proletariat, the establishment of Soviet /Government ami the rule of select Commissaries after the pattern of Lenin and Trotsky. Of course civil war and (bloodshed would be inevitable but that is a , trifle to the Industrial Unionists who generally preach •pacification but are not dismayed hb th idea of war in their own country. er THE METHODS OF ABUSIVE ATTACK.

| V*’c have before us now a copy of a Manifesto allegedly issued by one 1 Prank Lang'stone, Secretary King i Country Sawmill and Timber Workers’ Union. Whether .this is 'from ' the Union or is, Mr Langstone's own * invention we do not know. It- is 1 headed: ‘‘Please put this up m a prominent place for all to see. 3 This flamboyant shriek starts off by vabising the Secretaries of the Auck- ! land and Wellington Arbitration Un-

ions, and makes the mean contempti- | hie gibe, as an appeal to class j sion, that these Secretaries ‘ ‘ are being strongly supported, by the Masi ters,' ’ which in Labour circled is tantamount to calling them traitors. •It then says that the wages agree- ; ment obtained by these Arbitration Unions “arc very much below what |is being paid in this district” and ! put's forward the distinctly lying j argument that “all who subscribe to j those Unions must be prepared to | accept a lower' standard than they , arc now receiving.” We have yet to learn of a single instance, either in the King Country or out of it. where ..any of the .employers have suggested paying lower rates than the men are now receiving. However, any lying suggestion is enough for a mean purpose. Mr Laugstone should know that in many occupations higher rates than those specified in the Industrial Agreements are being paid. W.e hold no brief for the Arbitration Secretaries but merely as onlookers it strikes us as contempt!-

blc to find that men who have fought for their Unions for many years are subject 'd to abn'sive attacks by comparative newcomers and all apparently because they dare to have opinions of their own, or that the fresh hands want to gain position and bo Masters of the whole field.

This Circular to the workers: "We want you to add to your intellectual strength.” How nice and flattering. They certainly want more intellect because on the present lines of mere class passion and hatred' they ataand a good chance, if {successful, in wrecking the industry in which case the rank and file will be the sufferers.' WHAT HAS TO BE FACED.

| The Sawmill employers who want j steady trade and the workers who' want steady employment had better face the stern fact that this semi I.W.W, class unionism means constant trouble, strikes and bullying and an endeavour to confiscate the industry by force of numbers even if in so doing they smash it. There 5s no law to restrain the agitator who may wreck a Trade or Industry thereby destroying property and endangering people’s living. After many a strike in -which. hundreds of j families have suffered severely ' tho paid Agitator has merely gone to another field elsewhere. The people | have to protect themselves against | the designing schemes and abuse of the excessively class conscious crank. - jHe may be a man possessed of a | craze to establish a new form of I economic tyranny or his class may consist mainly of number one—'himself; in either case he is dangerous, to trade and industry on which the t living of the people truly depends. (Contributed by the N.Z. Welfare j League).