WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 7 November 1916, Page 6

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

War axd LAnort. TlT]' FARMERS' CASE. (From Our Special Correspondent )' Wellington Nov. 3. Around the'show-rings at iv.lincrston North yesterday the scarcity of farm labor was a staple topic of d:scn»s:on among the landholders, small and large, who lined the rails, taking, if would seem, but a languid interest" in tne competitions that were going on. The little employer, who requires only a. Inndy man to work with the members of the family, appears to be in as bad a ca.se as the big one w';o wants workers by the dozen or score. Probably the .Tfiuiawatu district has suffered more than most other districts have in this mpect. It took up the recruiting campaign very vigorously at the very beginning of the war, and lias maintained it with quite extraordinary enthusiasm ever since, with the result that hundreds of its young men, many of them sons of the farmers themselves, are now away ft the front. The position has been aggravated to some extent by a certain number of men previously employed in the country migrating into the towns to fill positions there, that have been vacated by workers who have responded to the call for volunteers. WOMEN WORKERS. The reasons why the average working man prefers town life to country life are easier to understand than arc the reasons that hold him back from the recruiting office. The hours in the town are better defined than they are in the country, the work looks lighter and, to the unexpanded mind, more respectable, means of recreation are mora accessible and the pay, on paper, is bigger. Whether the reasons are 4 good ones or bad ones need not be diseussed here, but they are sufficient for the country lad who insists upon purchasing his own experience. The remedy seriously suggested by some of the farmers yesterday was that girls and youug women should follow the example set. them by itheir sisters at Home and undertake the .lighter jobs that have to be done about a farm. Of course, there are numbers of women in the Manawatu and in other districts already doing this, but then; has been no organised effort to overcome the. prejudice which prevents hundreds of willing city girls going to their assistance. A PROTEST, Perhaps Mr. Richard' Tecce. the secretary of the Australian Mutual Provident Society, who is now on a visit to New Zealand, is better acquainted with what is going on in the Commonwealth than are the Labor leaders protesting against his assumption that there is 'a sympathetic bond" between the T.W.W. and "the legitimate Trades Union party." But from what local trade unionists have to say about the matter it is difficult to .believe Mr. Teeee intended his words to bear the construction that is being placed upon them by numbers of people. They insist that the Labor Party in Australia, speaking of it as an organised body and not holding it responsible for the indiscretions of some of its individual members, has no more sympathy with the propaganda and methods of the I.W.Wy than has the Labor Party in New Zealand. They have no excuses to make for the Australian workers for having voted against conscription, but they resent the suggestion that their perversity in this ' matter shows them to be the friends of anarchy and disorder. THE MEAT TRUST MENACE. Copies of a letter written by Mr. A. Eliott, of Palmerston North' dealing with the American Meat Trust with quite extraordinary candour were widely distributed at the Manawatu Show yesterday and to-day. The subject has been mentioned in this column on several occasions lately, but Mr. Eliott makes one or two assertions that have not appeared in such positive form before. "It is known," lie says, "that at least four of the freezing works in this country belong to, or are controlled by, the Meat Trust, and persistent efforts are being made to secure others. An attempt was made to purchase the Gear Works, and it is generally believed that one of the largest works recently erected was built with funds supplied by the Trust." These statements may be easily disproved if they aro not true, but so far they have been allowed to pass into current belief without any contradiction. The operations of the American buyers in the local markets suggest that they already have made their position very strong and that they have no intention of being ousted.