Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1910 THE LABOUR KALEIDOSCOPE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10139, 9 November 1910, Page 4

Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1910 THE LABOUR KALEIDOSCOPE.

The most remarkable thing about the present industrial turmoil is not, according to a Home paper, the number, extent, and variety of the disputes going on, but the bewildering suddenness witli which they arise and disperse. It is difficult to follow the movement day by day, it shifts so rapidly; and impossible to remember all its phases. It recalls the incessant shifting of Avaters in the Niagara rapids. At one moment they heave and boil up hero, while running smooth and level there, the next, the parts arc reversed, the towering wave flung towards heaven is gone, and the placid spot is foaming in fury. Unlike the movements of the sea, the motion has no order of rhythm; you .cannot tell where it Avill break out next, or how long the upheaval will last. So it is with the present rush of industrial troubles; every day brings a fresh one and removes another that seemed to threaten disaster* Thousands of men leave work on Monday and come back on Tuesday or Wednesday or next week. One day they will not approach the employers; the next they are quite friendly; and they treat their officials in the same way, now defying them, now submissively following their lead. At present the South Wales

miners have carried the new trade union version of the house that Jack built further than any of their colleagues, and are one or two turns ahead; but they have some keen competitors and may be beaten yet. The boiler makers are still in the field. What is the cause of this curious instability of purpose from day to day? Is it not the same thing as the unrest or discontent that arises from a real sense of wrong or injury. One can understand men settling down to a determined struggle to get more pay or to resist a reduction ; there is a solid and substantial stake in it. But this flighty rushing into trouble and then backing out of it is quite a different thing. It is so planless. Perhaps that gives the clue to one explanation . The men have no plan because they have nobody to make one. That used to be the function of their leaders, who were trusted accordingly; they attended to the business of the union, and gave the men a lead in peace or war. Now they are tco much immersed in politics to attend to the affairs of the union. They have no plan, and do not know how to adviso their members, who accordingly pay no atI tention to them. It is one of the results of the modern political activity of the unions. Political action is all very well, but it will never supply discontented workmen; it is too slow. The political harangues, and especially the teaching of the class war by Socialists, stir up the young men to make them restless and discontented. The aim of the politician is to get them to vote for him and to support the cause in Parliament; but that is very tame, and practically nothing comes of it. The discontented men interpret the teaching thev have received more simply and directly; they want to go on strike. The ''direct action" is the real trade union interpretation of Socialism. But leaders immersed in politics cannot attend to such matters as the actual-rela-tions with employers ; they are thinking about Bills and programmes and political questions. Consequently the men rush into strikes without, plan or strategy and blunder about ns best they can. They do not listen to their leaders because they have none.