The Daily News. FRIDAY, JULY 29. LABOR'S VOICE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 94, 29 July 1910, Page 4

The Daily News. FRIDAY, JULY 29. LABOR'S VOICE.

Militant Labor in >fe\v Zealand hat definite methods but 'indefinite goals: and when militant Labor is mentioned it by no means refers to the worken as a body, but to the men who profe« to speak for Labor and to voice its da mands. It seems.to the unbiassed stu dent of men and things that the voic< above referred to demands most thing; without promising assistance. The voici calls upon the Government to absolutely upset the existing social order, not be cause the people demand it, but becausi the Voice that speaks for a proportiw of organised labor professes to speak fo: New Zealand. Although the man \vh< labors is the backbone of any country he is a weakly spine when he is mon concerned with the using of the voici than the using of brain and sinew. Ii Recent utterances the Voice has indicate< that there is no close connection bet www it and' the Brain of Labor, for in oni breath the Phonograph demands th< cessation of borrowing and the spending of vast sums of money the country doei not possess. The Voice openly assert! that Labor is penalised by the existenci of private enterprise although Laboi lives on private enterprise—and so ii suggests the nationalisation of many in dustries in order that the hand thai feeds Labor may be withered. If Laboi had the necessary enterprise to combini with the idea of openly fighting Privat* Enterprise with wit, cash, brain, am work, Private (Enterprise might be beatei and take its conge manfully. But th< Voice does not propose to beat Private Enterprise with its own wit, its owi money, or its owm work. It calls on th< Government, which is the servant of th< banker, the squatter, and the community generally, as well as the servant of or ganised industry, to smite the "exploiters" with borrowed cash and with armies of State servants. The Premier.

Enterprise with wit, cash, brain, and work, Private (Enterprise might be beaten and take its conge manfully. But the Voice does not propose to beat Private Enterprise with its own wit. its own money, or its owm work. It calls on the Government, which is the servant of the banker, the squatter, and the community generally, as well as the servant of organised: industry, to smite the "exploiters" with borrowed cash and with armies of State servants. The Premier, j when he answered a deputation from, the (Trades and Labor Councils, demolished I their house of carda with a breath, pointj ins; out that the cessation of borrowing I would throw much labor idle. The Voice demands much work, well paid, but asks that there shall ibe no money to pay it with, and the Voice is a very husky one when it discourses on the social economy that is to give LaboT the fullest possible pocket by means of the least possible banking account. Where the Voice fails is that it speaks merely for the people of the towns and not for those whose quiet work gives the town man his job. Organised city Labor, which has nothing, whatever to do with,*he land—except that it subsists on the man who grows things—can suggest exactly what the other fellow shall do with the land, with the sole object of "bettering" the conrition of the minority for whom the Voice speaks. From the extraordinary number of demands made on behalf, of organised Labor it might be gathered that New Zealand was a densely populated manufacturing country 'where the problems -were similar to those of the North of England. The man with the voice always assumes that there is no necessity to do anything for anybody,but the minority he represents: It does" not matter what industry goes to the wall as long as the dear old method of swv > - tional spoon-feeding is enhanced p^d

there is spoil out of the chaos for the few. New Zealand does not depend for its credit in London or Australia, or any other place where it borrows its money, on the man with the voice. He is an adjunct, Unit not an absolutely essential one. If the whole of the people represented by the Voice were disorganised and did not build houses, or shoe horses, or lay bricks, cook meals, or make sausages', the remainder would survive. The Voice assumes that the people it talks for are absolutely essential to the carrying on of the country. Only the primal industries are really essential, and the land is the essence of all things. Nationalisation of this, that, and the other thing is not asked for or desired by the people who are essential to the "breakfast table" of the city worker. The man who wants tlhe State to foster him and to watch him from the cradle to the grave is almost invariably the man who lacks the necessary grit to accumulate sufficient comfort to make spoonfeeding unnecessary. Tn fact, the man ■with the voice wants everybody harnessed but himself, and he desires to be the driver.