AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8345, 30 January 1907, Page 5

AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

RAILWAY COMMISSIONERS. Received January 29, 11.9 p.m. SYDNEY, January 29. The Railway Commissioners have appointed Mr* Johnson chief commissioner and Messrs Kirkcaldie and Richardson assistant commissioners. Mr P. K. Johnson is assistant engineer to the Great Northern Railway Company in England and has been 35 years in the service of the company. He has had a wide experience. Mr Kirkcaldie is a member of the present commissioners, and Mr Richardson occupies the position of superintendent of lines in the State service.

. AUSTRALIAN WORKERS' " UNION. Recieved January 29, 11.17 p.m. SYDNEY, January 29. The annual conference of the Australian Workers' Union will meet on Thursday. Nine hundred and eight recommendations are on the agenda paper. The principal recommendation is that the Federal Arbitration Court be invoked to award 25s per hundred to sheep-shearers throughout the Commonwealth, and that the working hours be fixed at 44 weekly. PLAGUE.

Received* January 29, 11.17 p.m. SYDNEY, January 29. A man died from plague at Kempsey.

FEDERAL Received January 29, 10.30 a.m. MELBOURNE, January 29. Mr Deakin, the Federal Premier, speaking at the Australasian Natives Association banquet, said "Australia is federated, but is not federal —that the Commonwealth sentiment has yet to come." He predicted that before Parliament closed two parties would be established—Ministerialists and Opposition. The piecemeal method adopted in regard to the tariff could not be resorted to again, and required to be dealt with and disposed of as a whole. It could not stand alone, and must be accompanied by a Bonus Bill, which was its natural complement.

A LOST CHILD. Received January 29, 9.36 a.m. SYDNEY, January 29. Four years ago a child, 2\ years old, was lost from its parents' home and all efforts to trace it were unavailing. Recently news was circulated of a little white girl having been seen in a blacks' camp at Dalby, in Queensland. The police recovered the child and a photograph was taken and sent to the mother. The latter is satisfied that the child is her daughter. * ,THE LAND CASES. Received January 30, 1.13 a.m. SYDNEY, January 29. " W. N. Willis has been acquitted "on a charge of false pretences in connection with the land cases.

LABOUR CONVENTION - . PLATFORM. Received January 30, 12.43 a.m. f SYDNEY, January 29. The Labour Convention has adopted the following fighting f platform: State Bank, graduated land tax, free, education, technical and secondary university to be available on the Bursary' system, State pensions for nersons over 60 years of age and invalids, pure food bill, Zione system of railway fares,, full civil and political rights for State and municipal employees, and workers' pensions for accidents.

SHIPPING. Received January 30, 12.34 a.m. NEWCASTLE, January 29. Sailed—Kate Tatham, for Napier, \ THE LATE MR SEDDON. Received January 30, 12.34 a.m. BRISBANE* January 29. At a meeting of New Zealanders it was resolved to have Mr Essex Evans' poem, in tribute of the late Mr R. J. Seddon, engrossed and forwarded to Mrs Seddon.

THE COOKTOWN CYCLONE. KETCH PILOT LOST WITH ALL HANDS, Received January 30, 12.40 a.m. BRISBANE, January 29. ' The steamer that went in search of the ketch Pilot, which had been missing since the Cooktown cyclone, has returned, and reports that the vessel has been lost with all hands, including Mr Hargreaves, a member of the State Parliament, Captain Osterlund, Harbourmaster, and five of a crew. Two widows l and 14 children are left, unprovided for. The vessel was lost off Cape Flattery during the cyclone.

CABLE NEWS.

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