THE LABOUR FIGHT

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10558, 14 February 1912, Page 5

THE LABOUR FIGHT

MR HOGG'S OPINION. Writing to a Wellington paper, Mr. A. W. Hogg, of Masterton, says: The success at "the late general election of the Rallying Reform Party led by Mr Massey appears to be producing an ala.rming effect on some ofour pastoralists. At a meeting-of the general committee of the Masterton Agricultural and Pastoral Association oil Saturday, I notice that the ' members, not satisfied with passing j a resolution pledging themselves tosupport the Punedin Stock Agents and Wool Brokers' Association in re- ' sisting the demands of the waterside {workers that paper-lined bags should be provided for manure, went out of their way to unanimously designate the demand an "absurdity." Surely, sir, this seems an arbitrary way of disposing of a question that may afj feet the lieaTth, if not- the lives, of I hundreds of workers. At the same meeting Mr 0. C. Cooper: saicKit; been suggested that the' only .way .to bring tlie- workers' to thejpf:#us«s (wonicLbe to - remove the p6ll-tax from Chinamen .and allow , the country to be flooded witli Asiatics. That is ! what the diamond , robbers tried in South Africa, and you know the se- ! quel. The suggestion reminds me of 'a threat made by pastoralists in the I Amuri district, in Canterbury, over ' twenty years ago, that if tliey could . not get shearers to accept their terms they would import Kanaka laj bour from the islands. The throat ■ had a good effect on the electors at I that time, for the representatives of the overgrown pastoralists who had; i long been ruling.the eotfhtry ' were turned out of , power. In the fight that is just beginning, not between ."Labour and Capital, but between--Lti-, i bour and Land Monopoly, the att-i-' '.tude, threats, and intentions of the ' aggressive and overgrown pastoralists j | must not be overlooked.