from residents of Indwe, for removal of the “colour bar” from the Transvaal Mines, Works and Machinery Regulations.

from inhabitants of Pietermaritzburg, for legislation providing for the Direct Popular Veto.

from A. Leslie and 46 other occupiers of small Government allotments on the south coast of Natal, for freehold title on payment of balance of the purchase price.

from inhabitants of Ladismith, for legislation providing for the Direct Popular Veto.

from farmers and others in Hope Town, for the imposition of an adequate import duty on livestock, meat and South African products.

from Gertrude E. J. Yeld, for condonation of a break in her service.

from inhabitants of Vryheid, for legislation providing for the Direct Popular Veto.

similar petition from inhabitants of Howick.

similar petition from inhabitants of Durban.

from the widow of F. W. T. Armstrong, who served in the Native Affairs Department, for relief.

from A. Dickinson, Messenger of the Court, Griqualand East, for a pension.

from W. E. Aitkins, who joined the Cape Mounted Riflemen in 1890, for a pension.

Statement of Assets and Liabilities as at the 31st March, 1914, of the South African Constabulary Benevolent Fund, with memorandum thereon.

Return showing Revenue and Expenditure of the Railways and Harbours Sick Fund during four months ended 28th February, 1914.

Papers relating to land grants (Nos. 45 to 49).

These papers were referred to the Select Committee on Waste Lands.

gave notice that on Monday next he would move that under the special circumstances the action of the Land Bank in financing itself by means of an overdraft be condoned; also that interest at the rate of 4 per cent, be paid by the Land Bank to the Minister of Finance for all moneys advanced to the bank.

asked the Minister of Finance when he proposed to make public the details of his proposed alterations in Customs and Excise duties? The method the Minister was taking was exceedingly demoralising to business. The fact that the tariff was going to be altered or interfered with had already led to a good deal of speculation. It was extremely unsatisfactory and demoralising that there should be this period of suspense. The Minister should bring forward the proposals at the earliest possible moment.

said he recognised that what the hon. member said was correct but the circumstances were unavoidable. It was scarcely fair while the Budget debate was going on to lay these proposals before the Louse.

How are we to discuss the Budget without them?

The Budget debate ranges ever general principles. However, I am hurrying on the proposals and will lay them on the Table of the House as soon as possible.

said it was impossible to discuss the Budget without a knowledge of the proposed alterations. There might be some speculation while discussion was going on in the House, but the alterations the Minister indicated would come into force at the moment he did so, and therefore they would not be affected by subsequent discussions.

You will have a double debate—on the Budget and on the alterations.

Oh, no. The Minister must have his alterations prepared, and I hope he will lay them on the Table to-day or to-morrow. Some days were necessary in order to give instructions to the offices in various quarters. He did not suppose the Budget debate would proceed to any extent before the end of the week, and it might be possible at the end of the week to lay the proposals before the House.

Wo have the telegraphs.

We cannot use the telegraphs.

asked how the House was to follow the Budget debate unless they had before them the details of the proposed taxation? The Minister had referred among other things to the unimproved land tax, and had referred to deducting the value of improvements from the cost of the land. Hon. members had no idea whether the Minister proposed a tax on unimproved land or on the unimproved value of all land throughout the Union. He mentioned that as only one of the examples. Some people were unkind enough to say that the Government would not bring forward the proposals until they had had an opportunity of ascertaining the views of the House. Surely they ought to have a full statement before them before they went on with the Budget Debate. That afternoon the Minister of Railways and Harbours would move the Railway Budget, and no doubt that debate would be adjourned. The Minister of Finance must know that they ought to have all the details before them so that they could discuss the whole thing at once.

said there had been a good deal of speculation in regard to the taxation proposals.

The hon. member must only ask questions.

said he was leading up to a question. He asked the Minister to lay the taxation proposals before the House that week at any rate, so that the whole country would be in possession of the information necessary to deal with the matter.

said he had already said that he was doing his best to lay the proposals before the House before the end of the week. The details of the proposals had to be worked out, and it was taking some time.

said he had now some additional information with regard to a question which had been addressed to him by the hon. member for Springs with regard to certain railway quarters at Osplaats, which it had been said were anfit for occupation. He had made inquiries and was advised that there was no ground for complaint with regard to the quarters.

said that in order that the railway position for the ensuing year might be fully dealt with, it might be convenient if he laid before the House the results of the financial year just closed. It might be remembered that last year the Railway Budget contemplated a deficit of £35,613. He regretted to say that instead of that deficit the actual deficit which was anticipated—he said anticipated, because the actual figures could not be obtained for a few weeks—for the past year would be £288,520. Briefly, that amount was arrived at owing to the following causes. The deficit foreshadowed for 1913-14 was £35,613. There had been a shortage in Railway Revenue of £239,611, the excess in railway working expenditure was £225,106, the excess of expenditure in connection with the Harbours was £14,295. Then there had been an excess in other expenditure—strike expenditure, labour charges on capital works, etc., of £50,300, and minor excesses of £3,066. That gave a total of £567,991, but from that amount there was to be deducted first of all a saving in interest charges on capital owing to delay in carrying out work, amounting to £33,795. Also there must be deducted the harbour revenue, which exceeded the Estimates by £85,676, and an amount of £160,000, which was saved by reason of relaying work being delayed on account of the shortage of material from Europe and also on account of the scarcity of native labour in South Africa. Those amounts came to £279,471, and that gave the net deficit of £288,520. It would be noticed that the railway revenue would fall short of the Estimates by £239,611, and that shortage of revenue was largely responsible for the deficit of the past year. The shortage was attributable to the industrial troubles of July and January last. In January alone it was estimated that the immediate loss in revenue as a result of the strike was about £150,000. On the other hand, undoubtedly the deficit would have been greater but for the increase of the coal traffic during the latter part of the year. With regard to the anticipated revenue, he might just note for the information of the House that there had been an increase over the estimates in the matter of passenger traffic of £59,166, in parcels an increase of £20,762, goods and minerals a decrease of £184,092; coal had increased by £5,286, livestock had increased by £10,385, and other traffic receipts had decreased by £12,016. It would be seen that the estimated receipts for passenger traffic and goods and minerals would not be realised. There could be no doubt that that was almost entirely due to commercial inactivity, owing to the industrial disturbances. The excess in railway working expenditure was largely due to the fact that they had had to do a great deal more repair work in the workshops than erection work. This again was owing to the causes he had already referred to—delay in the arrival of material from Europe— and the consequence was that there had been a great deal of repair work instead of erection work. That had involved a considerable increase of the expenditure on the railway working vote, because hon. members would realise that the construction vote stood upon a different footing. They had had to increase the amount of ordinary working expenditure, and that represented the increase.

What is the amount of the fund?

said the fund at present stood at £355,000, of which he proposed to take £288,000.

Not much left.

(continuing) said they must build it up again for another rainy day, which he hoped would be far distant. To turn to the new year—the year in which they were at present, hon. members would see from the Estimates of Expenditure on the table that they had to meet a sum of £14,314,923, Of that amount the railways would take £13,012,958 and the harbours £1,301,965. The total amount asked for under this head was less by about £129,000 than the amount asked for last year, but he would have to explain to the House that as a matter of fact the actual working expenditure had considerably increased. The decreased amount on the Estimates was accounted for by the fact that the Government had put down this year considerably less for contribution to certain funds than before. Now to meet this amount of £14,314,923, it was estimated that during 1914-15 they would have a total revenue from railways and harbours of £14,248,923. Of this the railways were estimated to account for £13,237,000 and the harbours for £1,011,000. That would show when the estimated revenue was compared with the estimated expenditure that they were faced with a deficit during the next year of £66,000. That was not really a very substantial amount, and one which, by the fluctuations of traffic and revenue, it was quite likely that they would be able to wipe out, and he did not propose to make any statement yet as to how to provide for it. Now, to analyse the revenue estimates briefly. The estimates of revenue for the ensuing year had been based on receipts for the twelve months ending December 31, 1913. They had had to take into account revenue which was likely to accrue from the opening of new lines, the increase in coal traffic, and the effects of the recent disturbances. With the exception of passenger traffic and miscellaneous receipts the revenue had budgeted for on all heads for an increase. Parcels, goods and minerals, coal and livestock were all budgeted for increases, but he thought that on the whole the estimates were not unreasonable. It might look like lack of confidence to many that they did not estimate for an increase in passenger traffic. Last year had been a heavy year, and he was bound to say that he thought it was wise not to anticipate that they would have more to do than they had last year, particularly if they remembered that the effects of the drought and the strikes had still to be felt. The position generally was sure to develop during the coming year, and that these facts might affect the passenger traffic. In view of the estimated revenue during last year it might seem that their anticipations of an increase were somewhat on the sanguine side, because he had anticipated an increase of £116,685. But although that represented something like £356,296 more than they got during last year, hon. members would bear in mind the figures which he had already given—that they had lost approximately £150,000 as a result of the January troubles. Revenue to be derived from new lines was estimated at £28,000, the additional revenue from the coal traffic, which was substantial, was something like £150,000. With regard to the harbours, they had budgeted for an increase of £49,048, and seeing the increase in the revenue of the past year he did not think that that was at all unreasonable. The expenditure for the coming year had been estimated on past experience.

What was the total tonnage of goods carried last year?

said the total was 14,715,000 tons. If they looked for a moment at the commercial seaborne traffic to the competitive area, they found the following state of affairs—taking the percentage of traffic for the six months ending June, 1913, it worked out as follows: The Cape ports got 15.18 per cent of the traffic, Durban got 33.38 per cent., and Delagoa Bay 51.44 per cent. To enable the House to follow those figures more accurately, he might say that the guaranteed amount to the Cape ports was from 15 to 20 per cent., to Natal the guaranteed amount was 30 per cent., and to Delagoa Bay 50 to 55 per cent. At the end of the year the position of the Cape ports had gone down to 14.05 per cent., Durban had gone up to 34.62 per cent., and the figure for Delagoa Bay was 51.33 per cent. In 1912 the percentages were as follows: Cape ports 12.94, Natal 29.5 per cent., Delagoa Bay 57.55 per cent., and in December, 1912, the figures were as follows: Cape ports 14.2 per cent., Natal 32 per cent., while Delagoa Bay had decreased from 57 per cent, to 53 per cent. In June, 1913, the percentages were: Cape ports 15.18 per cent., Natal 33.38 per cent., and Delagoa Bay 51.4 per cent. The outstanding features of these changes, which were due to the readjustment of rates which was made for the purpose of seeing that the Union got a fair share of the trade, were the reduction of the undue percentage of Delagoa Bay, which was reduced from 57 per cent to 51 per cent., and on the other hand the increase at the Cape from 12 per cent to 14 per cent. The Cape ports had never, excepting on one occasion, reached the minimum figure, but unfortunately that happy state of affairs did not last, and they had got back to below the minimum figure, and were now getting 14 per cent. Another feature of interest was the steady and substantial increase in the share of the competitive business got by Natal. Delagoa Bay was the factor which had most to complain of, but they were not concerned with Delagoa Bay. He did not think from those figures that Natal had any ground for complaint— (hear, hear)—and he hoped her position would remain as satisfactory as it was. Let him briefly refer to the harbours. Last year, it might be remembered, he had promised the House that the claim that the harbours should be made to pay for them selves without depending on the Railway Administration should be dealt with, and he was carrying out his promise.

Whites ?

Yes, whites. I don’t think that is an unsatisfactory figure, but I hope it will continue to increase.

said that the House had listened to two very interesting speeches. He would not say that they were entirely satisfactory statements. They were, he thought, more interesting than satisfactory, probably. He should like to emphasise the principle laid down by the Minister of Finance that they ought, as far as possible, to practise economy before they ventured upon taxation. He would like to submit to some investigation the statement that the expenditure of the Union of South Africa had not increased since Union, but they had had such a dose of figures that he did not propose to do so this afternoon. It would be of immense assistance to this House and the whole country if the Minister of Railways could afford them a basis of comparison in railway working. His hon. friend would see how difficult it was to arrive at any comparison in railway working from the statement he had made. For instance, they saw that, since Union, the railway expenditure had advanced considerably. What they wanted to see against that expenditure was the justification for it—increased freight, increased passenger traffic, or increased goods traffic. He thought, if the Minister could without difficulty lay this information upon the Table during the next day or two, it would enable members on both sides of the House to examine these figures from that point of view, and enable the country to understand why the expenditure had been increased. The Minister had not yet given them the report of the Railway Board for last year. It was an extremely difficult thing for them to examine into the working of the railway system unless they had the report of the Board. His hon. friend on his left reminded him how desirable this was, especially in view of the drastic measures which had been taken in regard to the railway funds. He hoped that the House would this year devote itself to the consideration of this question, to the exclusion of all those questions which last year were allowed to thrust the question of finance on one side. The position was a serious one, and one that demanded the earnest consideration of every member of Parliament. He now begged to move the adjournment of the debate.

The motion was agreed to, and the debate adjourned until Monday next.

who rose amid Labour cheers, said that he had his doubts upon the wisdom of the arrangement made between the Government and the front Opposition bench, that between the debate which had just been begun and which was to be taken in pieces, a portion of the debate on this Bill should be sandwiched in. The first remark he wished to make about this Bill was to express his conviction that this House was not really competent, as at present constituted, to deal with it. He supposed they were to understand that this Bill embodied the first instalment of that remedial legislation which the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir T. W. Smartt) had so often appealed to the Government to introduce, but they on the cross-benches could not say that it carried them any further to the goal they desired to reach. In introducing the Bill the Minister of Mines favoured them with some very deep thoughts as to the tendencies with which this legislation would deal. As representing the view opposed to the Ministers, they must dub themselves Revolutionaries or Syndicalists or anything else the Minister liked to call them but the Minister was not exhaustive, for there were reforms and reforms, but reforms which sought merely to patch up the existing system were of comparatively little use. He believed the protagonists of every new idea had always been dubbed revolutionaries by those inert people who refused to march with the times. If it were in that sense that the Minister had dubbed them revolutionaries he (Mr. Creswell) accepted’ it freely, but if it were in a sense of a callous disregard of public interest and associated with which were violence and all those forces which prevented ordered progress in the State, then he would suggest that revolutionaries of that kind would always be found with those persons occupying positions of influence and power, who instead of treating a great movement on safe lines, tore up the traditions of the past and trampled upon such old established principles as that a man was entitled to do anything the law entitled him to do, and would not be punished unless he had committed offences, and nothing was sufficient to justify his being punished without trial—when they saw people going on those lines they were the dangerous revolutionaries.

They found that when Government came to deal with a subject like this they did not display that clearness of vision which inspired confidence. Even the hon. member for Beaufort West would find it difficult to support a Government that in the course of three or four months had put forward its proposals in as many different forms. Last December the Government published in the “Gazette ” the legislation which it thought was required. It was contained in two very detailed Bills; now they had one Bill—a sort of botched up mixture of the two Bills with a good deal of alteration and omission. Not only that, but the Bill did not express the whole policy of the Government, for in the Riotous Assemblies Bill there was a number of provisions which expressed the Government’s views towards Trade Unions which were now transferred to another Bill. How could the country really have any confidence that the Government had made up its mind as to what the meaning of this new movement was with which it was attempting to deal, when it could not itself maintain a consistent line for three or four months together? The Labour members’ view of this legislation was that they were bound to oppose it in every way in their power. They believed it was conceived in a totally mistaken spirit— (hear, hear)—and he was going to move as an amendment to omit all the words after “that,” and the substitution of the following: “No legislation relating to Trade Unions and the settlement of industrial disputes will conduce to the progress of South Africa which impedes the free development of associations of wage earners or hampers such associations in taking effective industrial action in defence of the interests of their members.” He wished to make clear the grounds on which support was asked for the amendment and to ask the Government to listen, not affected too much by prejudice. He thought the Government would admit that it had seriously misjudged the position in the first place. For instance there was the demand for an eight hours day from bank to bank on the mines, and Government was convinced by the strike more than by any arguments in that House. (Hear, hear.) On a former occasion—about 4 o’clock in the morning—he tried to point out how essential it was that Trade Union organisations, so far from being hindered, should be encouraged, as being of the greatest benefit to the whole of the country. The whole of the amelioration in the conditions of the wage-earners in England had been brought about by Labour organisations.

“Question.”

Had it not been for the movement towards combined action by the workers the standard of living of the vast majority would simply have been at the mercy of the employers, and the workers would have been ground down to the gutter. They had only to take the effect of last July on the Government and on the friends of the hon. member for Germiston. Before that the Government was adamant, and would have nothing to do with Trade Unions, but after the strike the Government was, at all events, prepared to recognise the Railwaymen’s Union. All through the history of industrial disputes nothing was attained through the mere goodwill of the employers. The first Trade Unions Act in England, which was passed in 1870, was to bring the unions under the law, so that they might have advantages which their position outside the law did not enable them to possess.

From time to time there had been judicial decisions which had reversed the main aim of the legislation in the past, and had been followed by amending Acts. It was recognised that the Trade Union movement was fulfilling a necessary national function. They (the Labour members) said that a very different idea inspired the present legislature. A child by reading those Bills, and also the Bills of last December, could see how different was the spirit animating the Government in conceiving that legislation. Here the idea was to bring the Trade Unions under the law for the purpose of getting them in such a position that they could be brought under the grip of the law and prevented from expanding. Here the Trade Unions had been able to grow to their present strength without any assistance from the Government, but they were certain that if that legislation went through, they would not be able to grow as well or as rapidly as they showed signs of doing to-day. He was one of those who believed that the Trade Unionists understood their own business a good deal better than hon. members of that House. (Labour cheers.) He had a conviction that the Minister’s views were very largely shared by members on both sides of the House. They looked on Trade Unions as a necessary evil to be curbed as much as possible, and if possible to curb their actions if it should mean inconvenience to the body of the employers. They (the Labour members) looked upon the Trade Union movement as the first step in what was a very large movement, the reorganisation of society, a shifting of the centre of gravity. Most emphatically that spirit was the spirit that was going to determine institutions of the future and would wipe away that era of unbridled competition.

On Socialist lines?

On Socialist lines certainly. Does the hon. member know what I mean when I say Socialist lines? I very much doubt it. Continuing, he said he meant the substitution of co-operation for that spirit of competition and the substitution of a spirit of comradeship instead of a system of “devil take the hindmost.” He knew that those were expressions which provoked a superior smile, but they were satisfied to work for that ideal and they looked upon Trade Unionism as being a step towards the realisation of it. He must explain a little further to the hon. member for Cape Town, Central, some of their ideals. A certain number of private individuals owned the means of production which a large number of other people had to use in order to live and who were becoming to an increasing extent the slaves and servants. They had an idea that no man was really free unless he had an effective voice in controlling the conditions under which he worked and in disposing of the wealth which his labour had produced. But they found that when it came to the disposal of the wealth which his labour had produced that he had no say at all. They saw that private persons who disposed of capital were becoming a closer and closer co-operation. He wondered how many stores were run in this country without co-operation. He did not think they believed very much in inconveniencing one another. They found in that Bill on all sides a departure from the spirit which had animated the English Act. It was specially provided in the English Act that when the Trade Unions came under the law their funds were still safe. Under the Bill it would be easy for the powerful money forces to deplete Trade Union funds by a series of malicious legal actions. They were told that under the Bill the registration of Trade Unions would be an enormous advantage. In that connection he would call the Minister’s attention to clause 8. He contended that the Trade Union portions of the Bill offered no advantage to Trade Unions. They gave advantages to their opponents to hammer them in ways which were not open to them to-day without a great deal of trouble. The best persons to his mind to frame Trade Union rules were the Trade Unions themselves. Proceeding, he said that on the Witwatersrand they refused to recognise Trade Unions, and the incident which caused a change in that respect was the strike in July. The Trade Unions would be able to work their way without any such legislation as that before them.

The object of the Bill was not to facilitate Trade Unions, its object was expressed in the first sentence of the title. “To make provision for the prevention of strikes,” but in trying to prevent strikes they were embarking upon a very difficult task indeed. Legislation was not going to induce large bodies of free men to work under conditions or longer hours than they were determined to tolerate. So far as that Bill dealt with voluntary conciliation, they on the cross-benches had no objection, in that respect it was following on right lines, but with regard to the part where they were going to extend to the whole of South Africa practically, with a few little alterations, the Industrial Disputes Act of the Transvaal, it would not serve that purpose. Was it the experience of the Government that the Industrial Disputes Act of the Transvaal had prevented strikes taking place? No! That Act was in force during the whole of last year. Nothing would prevent strikes taking place when men felt that they were working under conditions which they were determined to no longer tolerate. (Labour cheers.) The aim of that Bill he took it was the prevention of strikes, but there was a sounder policy to follow as far as possible to prevent extreme disturbances accompanying strikes and in trying to get over these industrial earthquakes with the least possible amount of temper being raised. They would not do it by the Act they were trying to extend now from the Transvaal to the other parts of the Union. Ultimately the best security they had against strikes being undertaken petulantly was the organisation of labour and the encouragement of the formation of large bodies of labour organisations. That system of Conciliation Boards came into being in England long before any official arrangement of that sort. It was the direct result of the formation of large unions sufficiently strong to impress upon the employers the necessity of meeting the unions that Conciliation Boards owed their inception. The cotton industry had been governed by voluntary Conciliation Boards for years and years, because the cotton workers were amongst the first to form real strong unions. In his explanation of the Australian principle, the hon. Minister left out a most important thing. He did not make clear that the Australian compulsory arbitration system recognised only organised bodies of labour, and did not recognise any of the free labourers, the odds and ends of unorganised labour; and while with one hand it took away the weapon of labour, on the other, it encouraged the organisation of employees into Trade Unions. The Canadian laws on that subject had been quoted. There was a kind of suggestion that legislation before them was on the Canadian principle but the hon. Minister in his own exposition of the Canadian principle clearly showed how far it diverged from it. In Canada the position was as in England, that in so far as it concerned ordinary employment the workers and the Trade Unions organisations were free in any conciliation between them and their employers. The conciliation was entirely voluntary. In Canada, where it concerned the public utility, the Government stepped in and said before you can strike you must have Conciliation Boards. It had been commonly understood in many parts of the country that our Transvaal Industrial Disputes Act was practically on all fours with the Canadian system and that the Bill before them was also, but it was very far from being so. That Bill, therefore, was not on the lines of the Canadian precedent. The Bill seemed to have its birth rather in the hysterics into which the Minister got during January and July. There was nothing in the Bill which was going to help the Trade Unions by one iota. It was going to hamper Trade Unions; there was nothing in the Bill that was going to lead to strikes being obviated, and there was nothing in a remedial sense in the way of bringing pressure on recalcitrant employers. To his mind and those of his colleagues, the Bill would be better left alone, to be considered by a new Parliament, in which the industrial population would be more congenially represented than it was to-day.

Dealing with some of what he called the fallacies of the measure, he said that if the House was going to interfere with the right to strike, they must give something in return, but nothing was given for the hampering of the right to strike. There was a sort of specious pretence of being equal and fair to both sides. Chapter 2 seemed so very fair. It was a criminal offence for anybody to incite employees in connection with a strike, and to balance that, so the Minister said, it was a criminal offence for anybody to incite an employer to a lock-out. When the leaders of Trade Unions did so, they did it on the Market Square, but when large employers met in order to exert pressure on their employees in one way or another they did not do it in the same public fashion. It was absurd to table legislation that looked fair on paper, but ignored the essential fact that to-day men organised to protect their interests and they must leave them free to withdraw their labour. The Minister had pointed to the number of men who were out of work and said it was the result of the recent disturbances, but a more searching examination would reveal the fact that it was not altogether the result of the last strike. They would see that the whole matter required complete reorganisation. They came to the fact that the employers were in a much more powerful position to wreak vengeance on their employees in this country than in other countries, owing to the slave labour which the Government assisted them to get in order to carry on their work. He asked the House not to read the Bill a second time, and not to proceed with this legislation. He thought the Government should look on the situation in a more sympathetic manner.

seconded the amendment, and said that what he had to say would be based on the assumption that they all desired to prevent strikes and that they all desired to get at and if possible remove the causes of industrial unrest. He quoted from John Stewart Mill, and said that if the Minister had not overlooked these lines he would have brought in a better Bill. What was to be the attitude of this country towards the industrial class, and more particularly what was to be the attitude of the industrial class towards their own environment and future? Hitherto they had to educate themselves to the idea which would preserve them from going backwards and which would act as an inspiration. Was it to be an ideal of inspiration under intelligent guidance or repression?

He was convinced to-day that modern society was absolutely engaged in a class war. (Hear, hear.) The Socialists, anywhere or everywhere, did not create this class war; they recognised it. It had been forced upon them. “We have been driven into it,” proceeded the hon. member, “and it is our intention, it is the intention of those for whom we speak, to take our part manfully, join in it with all our power and energy and spirit, and, when we come to the last ditch, not stop there, but leap over that last ditch, and carry the war into the enemy’s camp, until the enemy is routed from all possibility of return or re-existence. In this country to-day the class war exists, and the class war is going to be waged until one class is wiped out.”

“Blotted out.”

“Well, ‘blotted out,’ if the hon. member prefers “blotted out,” but a clean slate is better than a blot. The movement to-day is an intensely intellectual one, stirred by moral convictions. It is intellectual, as the result of a conviction; it is moral, because the leaders of the movement believe that that which morally ought to be, must be.” Proceeding, he observed that something had been said with regard to the suitability of this Bill. Where the Minister, with all his sincerity, had failed, was that he had not read the signs of the times. His finger was not on the industrial pulse. He did not seem to recognise the trend of feeling, still less the trend of thought. Such measures as were brought forward by the Minister and by the Government were going to intensify by irritation, until there would be something worse than bloodshed in this land before ten years had passed away. He spoke as the working-classes of this country had declared again and again. This matter had gripped the working classes here with all the force of religion. They were engaged in a crusade, and until the victory was theirs, the crusade was going on. He did not admire the analysis which the Minister made the other day, when he separated the people into two classes—the reformers and those terrible people the Syndicalists. The Minister need not go into a fit when he (Mr. Haggar) used that term. The London “Times ” said that “there was nothing in the essential principles of Syndicalism but that which was admirable,” and the “Spectator,” another Conservative organ, said that “the ideal of Syndicalism was all that might be desired.” The Minister’s analysis was most incomplete, and it did him very serious discredit. He would ask him to quote one instance where the so-called reformers had done a single thing to uplift the working-classes or advance their cause?

Reforms were no use. They had been told by a very respectable authority, not known in that House, he admitted, that it was bad policy to put new cloth upon old garments. It was bad policy to put new wine into the old wine skins. If they were going to have new wine, they must have new skins. He hoped that the Minister, for his own self-respect, would abandon that foolish position. If he had said that there were two schools—the evolutionary and the revolutionary—he would have been nearer the truth. The evolutionary was the egg up to the 19th day, and the revolutionary was the egg after the 20th day had passed. That was the revolution they were after. What they were out for was not a dividing-up. The Government believed in a levelling-down. What they were out for was a complete social and industrial revolution—a revolution in feeling, a revolution in thought, and a revolution in existing relationships. They were out for right relationships between man and man, between the employer as long as he existed and the employee. They did not want remedial legislation. We had no right to have cures for typhoid. We had no right to have typhoid. They did not want remedial legislation, because they did not want the evil. He asked the Minister not to talk about remedy. It was wrong. What the Socialists were after was not a distribution of all wealth, not equitable distribution of all wealth; what they were after and what they would gain as sure as Mr. Speaker sat there or, if they did not gain it, those immediately following them would, was a just distribution of the wealth produced by labour. Lord Furness had said that the time had come when those who worked would have a proportionate say in determining the terms and conditions of their labour. That, remarked Mr. Haggar, was Syndicalism, pure and simple. He was going to assume that they were all anxious to prevent strikes, though he was not going to run away with the cant that strikes had never done any good. They had frightened the Government of this country. More than that, they had brought the Government to a consciousness of which they were utterly incapable until July 4. When the hon. member for Fort Beaufort went to Salt River to address the railway workers, he took with him the Mayor of Cape Town, who said that their Labour leaders had said on the previous day that they did not believe in strikes. He (the Mayor) did not believe in strikes, and that there was a time when men ought to strike. Mr. Haggar went on to say that there was only one way to avoid strikes and that was to prevent the conditions out of which men must rise, or lose their self-respect. The Bill was most disappointing to him, and he thought to all who read the former Bill and who read the speech which the Minister delivered in Johannesburg some time ago.

The Minister then stated that he intended to remove the causes of unrest. Was he sincere then or was he sincere now? Why had the Minister not brought forward a Bill deliberately aimed at removing the causes of industrial unrest? The Labour members came to Parliament resolved to do their very utmost to bring about a solution just to all, but what encouragement had they received? They had brought forward motion after motion and measure after measure similar to those which had proved a success in other countries, but without avail. What were the conditions of real reform? The first mistake the Minister had made was his assumption that the causes of unrest were local. How could they have a universal movement produced by local causes? In order that any reform might be satisfactory it must have at least three qualifications—first it must be radical, then it must be rational, and finally any reform to be satisfactory must be thorough. But the Bill treated the men as if they were irrational. One of the causes of the industrial unrest was that the alleged reforms had not materially benefited the working classes. To-day in England, after a most prosperous year, wages were lower and prices were higher, and the condition of the people was bad. Hon. members could see that for themselves if they went down to the Docks and saw the Australian immigrants, who were a degraded, diminutive, and almost hopeless lot of people. Industrial unrest, continued Mr. Haggar, was mainly economical. There was a stoppage in economic progress. Were the men on the Rand better or worse off than they were in the days of the so-called Kruger oppression? The experience of ten years of ten of the greatest countries in the world showed that gold production had increased by 100 per cent., commerce by 115 per cent., food production 68 per cent., population only 48 per cent., and wages 10 per cent, while prices had gone up from 25 to 65 per cent. With these stern economic facts before them was it remarkable that there was unrest? All the old weapons and methods had failed to remove the causes or to bring about a condition of lasting peace and substantial progress. The workingman, who had to depend on someone else for a chance of earning his living, might be beaten for a time for, like a soldier, he fought on his stomach. That was where he was checkmated every time. The real question to-day was not wages, and no increase of wages would benefit the workers at all until conditions were altered. Take the January affair, there was no discussion a.t all as to wages, hours or conditions of labour, the real point being that Government had no moral right to turn men out of their employment into the streets to starve. It was a fight for status. The men who had produced all the wealth were saying they were going to have a proportionate say in determining the conditions of their own labour. Let him say with all the meaning he could put into it that the working classes were going to have that no matter what it cost, and although the streets of Johannesburg and Cape Town or any other town might flow with blood. Those men had made up their minds that it should be a fundamental condition that they should have a say in determining the terms and conditions of their labour. That feeling of rebellion against that which ought not to be, existed.

Let them take the professions. They did not add one penny to the wealth of the community, yet all those professions determined the conditions under which their services might be had, and were backed up by the Government and by the law; but the moment the workers said that they wanted the same thing the Government got a 12-pounder gun. They did not use it, however, because he supposed they had forgotten the powder. They should go to the assemblies or those men and see how they understood those social and industrial questions. It was not a pleasure for them to see starving wives and children any more than it would be a pleasure to hon. members of that House. The Minister spoke about direct action, and he (the speaker) wished that members would not discredit themselves. Direct action did not mean dynamite or force. It meant the complete mobilisation of the forces of labour, and they believed that was the best means to adopt against the employers. Direct action did not mean force of any kind, but it meant direct representation. In Durban they had fought for that years ago, and how many of them had cause to regret it in those days? In all their claims for co-partnership the Labour principles were recognised. They claimed that the wealth produced by labour had not been justly distributed. The Minister must recognise that the workingmen of this country must have the deciding voice in determining the conditions of their own employment. They had had a good deal of conciliation now for years, and what had it attained ? It had succeeded in producing a party of shreds and patches. His objection to conciliation was this—it presupposed and it justified, and it strengthened the very system from which those evils came. Why was nothing done to remove the causes? The title of the Bill read, “A Bill to make provision for the prevention of strikes.” How was that to be done? By conciliation or by arbitration? What would be said if a plague broke out in Cape Town and he tried to get rid of it by throwing the corpses out into the street? Yet that was what the Government was trying to do in regard to that matter. Did the Minister ask them seriously to allow the disease to go on ? Conciliation and arbitration intensified the system which had produced the evils. In Canada, where capitalism was at its height, strikes and lock-outs were more frequent than in Australia and New Zealand, where labour had a large sway. They had to provide in this country opportunities for every man, woman and child to have the means of a decent life. He referred to the conditions of the people in different parts of the world, and in respect to Johannesburg he wondered if the hon. Minister had ever sat at the bedside of young men who ought to be strong and stalwart, with 40 years of life still before them, but who would shortly die and leave wife and children to the cold mercy of the world. Such things as that were reasons for the industrial unrest. But the Government did nothing in that Bill. Perhaps it was because they dare not; the moment the Government lifted a hand to point out the evils of the present system, they were lifting their hand against the system that had dammed this country ever since the white man came into it. He was not referring to the individuals who were in the system, for the capitalists were as much at the mercy of the system as those who were left to die in the street. Until they were prepared to fight the system they must be prepared for the result. What was to be the policy of the country What was to be the attitude of the country towards the industrial crisis? If the hon. Minister really meant to do any good, let him fling the Bill away where it ought to go, get down to the root causes, and put aside all insincerity. The working-classes of the country were on the verge of despair and that condition would continue to grow unless the Government recognised it. The reason that despairing people did not rebel was because they did not know the causes of their misery. The Government should really bring in something to deal with the causes or nothing at all.

said that there might be some little feeling of disappointment in the minds of people outside the House that the hon. member for Jeppe and the hon. member who had last spoken had shown no indication whatever of any desire to make the measure a workable one. It would have been better if the hon. member and his friends had given a little more indication that if in another year there were more members in that House who were of their way of thinking, they would be able to do something to get a workable measure on the Statute-book, or do something which would relieve the country of the inconvenience to which recent events had put it. But the hon. members on the cross-benches so far as he gathered, only looked upon the thing from their own point of view. They looked at it purely from the point of view of the men who were now members of the Trade Unions, and he thought it was perhaps, not too much to say the hon. member for Jeppe narrowed it down still further to those who were members of the Trade Unions concerned in the mining industries of the Transvaal. The hon. member had also dealt to some extent with the employers, but he left out of all consideration the public of this country. (Cheers.) After all, the public of this country were not merely divided into two classes, those who were known as members of Trade Unions, and those who were classed as employers. The public had a very direct interest in those matters. They in South Africa had had very serious troubles; the whole country had been very greatly affected by those troubles, and was it not their duty as the Parliament of the country to do their best to find some solution, to do something which would remove the likelihood of those troubles being repeated? In other words, were they not bound, if a measure such as that was before them to either adopt it or improve it, or if they could not do that, make some concrete suggestions and put forward something constructive for the benefit of the classes immediately affected; employers and employed, and the public of the country.

He did not think it was an unfair criticism to make when he said that not one single word in the speech of the hon. member for Jeppe had anything constructive about it. The hon. member objected to the Bill apparently on the assumption that it definitely said there should be no strikes; but he (Mr. Chaplin) did not find that in it at all. A Minister who brought forward a measure which attempted to get rid of strikes, believing it would make them impossible, would be in a fool’s paradise. That Bill did try to ensure a reasonable breathing time being allowed, and that a strike should not be undertaken until methods of investigation and conciliation had been first tried. That was objected to, because it put a weapon into the hands of the employers to prepare. But it was two-sided. In any case, it was desirable, in the interests of the public, that there must be some means adopted of delaying an immediate decision and getting the whole facts considered before violent action was taken by either side. In this country they were not often faced with anything in the nature of a lock-out. There was very little risk of a lock-out, the reason being, of course, that there was a very large amount of native labour, which was collected with considerable difficulty, and which the employers were not going to get rid of unless absolutely forced to do so. So that the hon. member would see that, when he objected to anything that delayed a strike, he had got a weapon entirely on one side. What that House had to do was to find something which would make it less likely that disputes between employers and employed would boil up into a ferment. They had to consider whether that Bill was the best means that could be devised under present circumstances to accomplish that object. The hon. member for Jeppe said the Minister had changed his mind; he had brought in a draft of one Bill, and had now introduced another Bill, which differed from the previous one very materially. The Minister had also changed his mind on another point. At the beginning of the session they were told that that legislation would not be brought forward at all. He (Mr. Chaplin) thought that was a wrong view, and they on that side of the House had expressed their opinions on that point. He was glad that the Minister and his colleagues had now changed their minds, and they were to be congratulated for doing so.

Business was suspended at 6 p.m.

resuming his speech said that, before the adjournment, he was endeavouring to point out that, when they had a Bill of that kind brought up, more especially after the very serious events of the last nine months, surely the duty of all parties was to do what they could to see that the Bill was discussed in a proper manner, and assist in providing some solution of avoiding troubles of the kind from which that country had recently suffered, and he thought it was generally agreed, and that the House would agree, that a measure of that kind could hardly be dismissed as the hon. member for Jeppe and his friends had endeavoured to dismiss it with a few remarks—vague remarks—which would be more in place on the Market-square—a few vague generalities about resolutions, sham or real, past, present, and to come. As far as they on that side were concerned, they were entirely of the opinion that reasonable steps must be taken to provide machinery for the settlement of disputes, and they recognised that recognition must be given to the just demands, when they were just, of Trade Unions and other Labour organisations. They were agreed that, whatever machinery was provided, it should be such as to be likely to improve the relations between employers and employees, and that such status as was given by law to Trade Unions must be such as to make them forces working for peace, not entirely for political action and still less for revolutionary ends. It had always seemed to him that in that country it should have been easier than in other countries to build up suitable Trade Union organisations, and secure for them adequate recognition, because the white men in this country who were the leading men of the Trade Unions were not, as a general rule, in the position of the ordinary workman in more densely populated countries.

Their social status was higher, their standard of living was higher, and in many cases their education was higher, and it had always seemed to him an easy matter in that country to meet satisfactorily the state of affairs as to the status of the Unions. Unfortunately that had not proved to be the case. He thought it was fair to say that the aggressive attitude taken up by some of the friends of hon. members on the cross-benches, and hon. members on the cross-benches themselves had militated against this satisfactory state of affairs coming to pass. It had prevented many men, skilled workmen, from joining the ranks of the Trade Unions. He knew many men, who, if they had been in the Old Country, would have joined a Union, but had thought it better to stand aloof out here. That was not a satisfactory state of affairs. For the same reason many employers had refrained from recognition of Unions, when recognition would have led to a better state of affairs. What they had to do was to put Trade Unions on such a basis that there could be no reason why the best class of men should not join, and why the strictest employer could not afford that Union recognition. He did not suppose they would get a Utopia or the millennium in five minutes. How far was that Bill going to take them towards a better relationship between the employer and the employee? They had the experience of other countries to guide them, and though the difference between that Bill and the legislation of other countries had been pointed out by the hon. member for Jeppe, there was no reason why they should slavishly follow the legislation of one country or the other. It would be agreed that other parts of the Empire had made serious mistakes, and they should study their work and take what was best to suit the circumstances and characteristics of this country and frame legislation, not only likely to appeal to the workmen and the employer, but also the general public.

In this country there were certain special conditions which it was necessary to recognise. In the first place, we bad, unfortunately, apart from the Government concerns, one dominating industry. He said “unfortunately.” Of course, it was obvious if they had more the country would be better off. From another point of view, it was unfortunate, because, owing largely to the efforts of the hon. member for Jeppe and some of his friends, the affairs of this particular industry were discussed ad nauseam and discussed so frequently and with such vindictiveness in many cases that the true perspective of the whole state of affairs was often shut out. There was another difference. In other countries industries were largely concerned with producing certain articles of commerce. The price of those articles varied in accordance with the cost of production. We had to recognise that in other countries a tendency existed on the part of employers and employed to reconcile their differences and, so to speak, recompense themselves out of the pockets of the taxpayers. In this country the product of the predominant industry was gold, which, as they all knew, to all intents and purposes had a fixed price. Then there was a third characteristic, and that was that, so far as the larger industries were concerned, there was very little likelihood or a lock-out by the employers, and the chances, therefore, were that trouble must arise rather from strikes. As regarded the features of this Bill, there were certain provisions as to the right of the Minister to set up a register and control registration offices. While he raised no particular objection to those clauses, he really did not see why the matter should have been introduced into this Bill. It seemed to him to rather cumber the Bill. In this measure there were two main objects, which, he supposed, the Minister wished to secure. The first was to provide machinery for conciliation, and in this respect he had chosen to a large extent what was the system in England, i.e., the voluntary system of conciliation. The hon. member for Jeppe was good enough to say that he did not object to that, because he did not think it would make a bit of difference whether it was there or not. He (Mr. Chaplin) thought at any rate that the experience of England went to show that in many cases it had worked very well, and he thought it was unquestionable that it was doing very much better work than the system of compulsory arbitration, which was tried in Australia. That system seemed to have broken down utterly and completely. (Hear, hear.) The second object was to ensure a breathing time, so to speak, after a dispute arose before anything untoward occurred. That was a Canadian feature, and on the whole he thought it had worked well in Canada. As far as he understood, however, there was no political Labour Party in Canada, and Trade Unions were not exposed to the temptation to join one particular political party. He thought there was no doubt that if that state of affairs prevailed in this country it would be far better for the bona fide objects of Trade Unions.

With regard to this question of conciliation, it seemed to him that it was doubtful whether at first these provisions would have any very great result. To that extent he agreed with the hon. member for Jeppe that there were certain difficulties about it, and he was naturally compelled to look to the largest industry in the country, where he saw that they had a large number of individual mining companies, and it seemed to him that it might be difficult to have a permanent Conciliation Board to deal with the affairs of each company. What he supposed might be evolved in time would be a union of employers to deal with the unions of men concerning the particular problems of each particular trade. At the present moment, while he thought it was quite right that provision should be made in this Bill for the constitution of these permanent Boards, he was inclined to think that more good would be done in the immediate future by what might be called conciliation ad hoc. He was not sure that that would not lead at first, at any rate, to the best results of the proposals in the Bill. They would be told that the voluntary system of Conciliation Boards was recommended by the Economic Commission, and that the Government had not put in a provision recognising the Federation of Trades. Well, he said frankly that in this respect he did not in the least agree with the recommendation of the Economic Commission. Of course, the hon. members on the cross-benches would say that he was picking out from the Commission’s report what there was in favour of his own arguments and rejecting what was not in favour of his own arguments. The best answer was that he would agree probably with far more of the recommendations of the Economic Commission than would hon. members on the cross-benches. (Hear, bear.) The question was why should provision not be made in accordance with the recommendation of the Economic Commission in this regard? He thought that one extremely reasonable argument was that if they were going to get a settlement, an arbitration or an agreement or a friendly discussion on points arising in a particular trade, they had a far better chance of doing so when the people who were to discuss the thing round a table were people who were intimately connected with that trade. If they were going to say that members of the Federation were to take the place of the representatives of the trades specially concerned, he thought they were going to run very great risks. If the union specially concerned wished to be specially represented by any man of that kind, it could always make him an official of the union concerned, and then, provided the union registered under this Bill, that particular official could come forward and represent the trade concerned. But there was another and perhaps more practical argument, and it was that they all knew what had been the work of the Federation of Trades in this country. The Economic Commission, if he remembered rightly recommended that the Federation should he recognised because it was the last bulwark between peace and a strike. They knew perfectly well it was nothing of the sort, and the experience recently in New Zealand had been the same. Now he thought it was quite right and reasonable that the Minister should have the power of intervention.

In this country the Minister took the place of the Board of Trade in England. The Minister, under clause 6. he supposed, was going to appoint someone who was to be conciliator-in-chief, the professional conciliator, representing the Government in this matter. All he could say was that ,if the Government were going to make such an appointment, he hoped they would appoint someone who was thoroughly conversant with all the details of this kind of legislation, who knew the industrial conditions of the country, who was a man of education and character, and a man in whom everybody would have confidence. Of course there was the further question that when these awards had been made by Conciliation Boards, how were they to be enforced? He saw that the Bill made provision that some of these awards might be made orders of Court. That, he supposed, was when an arbitration took place and by the consent of both parties the award could be made enforceable in that way. He did not know about the necessity for this provision for arbitration, because it seemed to him that there was nothing to prevent both parties from going to arbitration and agreeing that the award should be made an order of Court, quite apart from the provisions of this Bill. But the Bill did not make provision for the solution of what might be in many cases another difficulty. Let them suppose that an employer went to arbitration or before a Conciliation Board on some question which concerned the main body of his men and those who belonged to the union, and the proceedings took place in accordance with the machinery provided here, but employed at the same place were a number of non-union men. The question was how far these awards were to be made binding upon parties who were not parties actually to the arbitration. He now came to the second branch of the Bill, which was the provision of machinery founded on the Canadian system. The hon. member for Jeppe objected to the proposal that strikes or lock-outs should be made illegal pending the investigation. He (Mr. Chaplin) thought they had the most overwhelming testimony in favour of this, because, if they looked at the New Zealand Act, which came into force only at the beginning of this month, they had the same provision. They had it in the Queensland Act, and also in the New South Wales Act, both passed in 1912.

When they had all these countries thinking it necessary to adopt these limitations he did not think South Africa need be particularly backward in adopting something of that nature. Whoever was acting on behalf of the Government it was absolutely necessary that he should be a man who knew his own mind. He should be a person of standing, who should know the law, and when he saw that the law was broken no matter by which side—he should enforce it. (Hear, hear.) The beginning of the trouble last July was due to the fact that these conditions were not observed, a want of knowledge and decision on the part of the Government officials leading to a great deal of trouble which otherwise might have been avoided.

Supposing they had these prohibitions, how were they going to enforce them? It was easy to enforce a penalty against two or three employers, but it was by no means so easy to enforce it against thousands of men. The other Dominions had laid it down that in some cases the men’s wages might be touched, and in others that the Unions should incur some responsibility. One hoped that as a result of legislation these provisions might not be wanted, but it was useless to frame penalties without providing for their enforcement. The whole question turned, to a large extent, on what kind of unions we were going to have in this country. We started from a different basis from that on which legislation in England started. In England they started on the assumption that combinatinon for Trade Union purposes was wrong, but here we did not. What we had to do was to improve the status of the union, to make them bodies to which everyone could look up and bodies which would devote themselves to bona fide Trade Union objects But anyone who had listened to the speeches of the hon. members for Jeppe (Mr. Creswell) and Roodepoort (Mr. Haggar) would not feel very hopeful. (Loud cheers.) He was quite satisfied that if once we could get Unions established on a proper basis the influence of the men concerned would see that the leaders were going to work for peace and not for mischief. (Cheers.)

The Bill provided for the registration of unions. Looked at from a purely material point of view there was not much inducement to unions to register, but that was because we did not start on the basis that Trade Unions were illegal. We fell back, therefore, on three points. First of all, there were some minor inducements which could be added to in other legislation, and secondly, we had the possibility of compulsory registration. He thought it would be a mistake to compel people to register. Then Ave fell back on what he thought was the most important inducement of all—that was the public estimation in which the Unions were to be held. (Hear, hear.) That might seem rather far-fetched, but he felt convinced that the average workingman would see that it would pay far better to co-operate with the Government and the employers and the general sentiment of the country in getting unions established on a basis which would carry confidence. (Labour laughter.) Of course, the hon. members on the cross benches laughed, because this was quite opposed to their policy. (Cheers.) However, he knew perfectly well why the Bill would not be satisfactory to these gentle men. The reason, of course, was that during recent months there was a certain amount of sympathy with them, on the ground that there was no machinery with which these matters could be dealt, but that was an omission, and the hon. members on the cross-benches knew that, if proper machinery were provided, the public would say that, if the men did not take advantage of that the responsibility rested with them. (Cheers.) It appeared to him, as time went on we were likely to find—always provided that we could hit on the proper machinery —that a great deal would be done to put the Unions on a status which would carry confidence with the men. In this respect the Minister would have been well advised to deal with what he had called the political question. They could not prevent Unions taking part in politics, but some provision should be inserted similar to those in the Act passed last year by the British Parliament, providing machinery for authorising political expenditure by a Union. A man who joined a society for purely Trade Union purposes might object to his money being handed over to the hon. member for Jeppe for carrying on a propaganda with which the man did not agree. (Hear, hear.) The Bill, of course, was not perfect—some of its provisions were cumbersome, and wanted shortening. They might have the most perfect machinery, but unless there was a genuine desire on the part of the people concerned to give proper effect to the machinery, then the Bill would not be a success. At an earlier stage, the hon. member for Jeppe had stated that not a single Union would register. That showed the assistance the hon. members on the cross-benches were ready to give to secure a more satisfactory state of affairs, but, in spite of them or without their assistance, the thing would be done in time, and it would be recognised that proper machinery must be properly used, and that it would be in the interests of the men concerned to see that the Unions were properly run without regard to ulterior politics. (Cheers.) When they had arrived at that state of affairs the whole country would be better off than it was to-day. When the attempt was made it was a great pity if the hon. members on the cross-benches showed no indication whatever of giving a lead to those whom they invited to follow them, and helping to place on the Statute-book a measure which, properly threshed out, would be of immense advantage to all concerned. (Cheers.)

said he was going to try to shorten the discussion if possible. It was quite plain from what they had heard that afternoon that the Bill was not going through if it was going to be discussed clause by clause. The hon. member for Jeppe and his friends showed that they were determined to oppose the Bill because they did not bring it in. There was no room for advertisement, (Laughter.) The thing was brought in by the Government, and therefore it was a thing to be opposed. When he heard the hon. member for Jeppe—whom he recognised as an authority on industrial matters—talking some balderdash about shifting the basis of society—good Heavens! a small minority of this country was going to shift the basis of society. (Laughter.) When he (Mr. Merriman) heard that, he could not help thinking of a story he had heard of President Kruger, to whom someone went from a neighbouring town with an idea of shifting the basis of society or something of that sort, and the President said to him: “Go back to your friends and tell them to remember one thing—I have got the rifles.” The idea of the heroes of the Trades Hall shifting the basis of society! If they had not been deported they would have been dead and forgotten now, but thanks to the Government they had been put on a horse, and now they were roving about oversea waving the red flag like heroes.

The hon. member for Jeppe had talked very loudly about the workers. Who were the workers in this country ? Did they ever hear of them? The workers here were the people who got 30s. or £3 a month in order to fill the pockets of the gentlemen who called themselves workers. (Cheers.) The workers who the hon. member said secured the great resources of this country, what were they compared with 200,000 men who did labour at the resources in this country and got precious little consideration? Proceeding, he said with regard to that Bill he looked upon it as an honest attempt by the Minister of Industries to do what was really a useful thing and try what was called remedial legislation. He did not think the hon. member had been particularly successful in the shape in which he had got it. He had two Bills rolled into one. He had got a Conciliation Bill and a Trade Union Bill rolled into one. With regard to the Trade Union Bill—was that necessary at the present time? They could never force legislation upon these people, and in good truth why should they? The Trade Union was a voluntary association. Why should they force a law upon that any more than they enforced the law upon the excellent clubs here and elsewhere. Was his hon. friend in favour of forcing Trade Unions upon everybody? Let him recollect that the majority of working-men were outside the Trade Unions. The Prime Minister had said at the beginning of the session, “If there is one thing we must do it is support free labour in this country.” Were they going to do that if they said that unless a man belonged to a Trade Union he was “that disgusting expression which had been used by Trade Unionists,” who said they would not work alongside him. He did not think it was wise. They would have some Trade Unions registered and some not registered.

In regard to conciliation, well, he thought that was an admirable idea and one which had been followed out by most countries of the world; even that up-to-date power Turkey. (Laughter.) But the hon. member for Germiston never said a wiser thing than when he said we must not slavishly follow other countries, for the whole basis of society in this country was entirely on a different standing from that of any other country. The unconsidered toilers had no voice in these arrangements

They will have by and by.

I am afraid they will, but it will be a voice that will cry out under the lash of the many Trade Unions. They could not be looking forward, he added, into the sweet by and by when his hon. friend had the whip in his hand. Mr. Merriman went on to say that he thought they might take experience from other countries. It was very valuable to show what was thought by impartial observers in other countries. In England Trade Unions were upon a voluntary basis only, and that was the reason they had worked so well. The people had been educated up to them. Quite recently they had three most valuable reports. That of Sir G. Askwith presented to the House of Commons from industrial memoranda provided by the Labour Department, on laws affecting strikes and lockouts in various countries. The result was an adherence to the British voluntary system. What did Sir G. Askwith say ? Reviewing the Canadian law he said, “We have come to the conclusion that the establishment of a system of monetary penalties is not desirable and that such penalties as prohibition of assistance to persons in breach of agreement should not be made legally obligatory. We have stated, however, that it would be undesirable for people to countenance the breaking of their agreements.” They wanted to keep to the old voluntary system, said Mr. Merriman, and in Canada, owing to this very provision, of compulsion and provisions connected therewith the conciliation had been made immensely unpopular, and two Congresses of Trade Unions had passed a motion in favour of the repeal of the Act. Nevertheless, conciliation was a good thing, but it was not good that it should be enforced by penalties, and in that way made distasteful.

Continuing, he asked what was the value of conciliation, and what was the idea of conciliation? Was it not to prevent people from going hot-headed into a strike and finding themselves landed in the strike, with the result, that a grave state of affairs was created? The other thing was that when they made their award, and it was published, then everybody knew what the award was, and then public opinion formed itself, and it tended in nine cases out of ten to discourage a strike. That was the real value of conciliation. They must recognise that they could not dragoon people into these things. Now with regard to New Zealand. This was a most instructive thing. He would like to read what was said about New Zealand, which was a great country for experiment, which had no bothering natives or two races, and where they had recently, on a somewhat small scale, what had taken place at Johannesburg. They could not force people to take these things, and if the will of the people was against it they could not do it. Let them look at their last attempt at conciliation. Mr. Millar, who brought in the Bill, said that their experience of conciliation and arbitration had been a great success—apparently he was the Minister, and as the Minister he was bound to say that, added Mr. Merriman—and he went on to remark that there were some men who preached disaffection with the awards of the Arbitration Courts because they were not getting an increase in wages.

The cause of this was (continued Mr. Merriman) that times gradually improved, and the men succeeded in getting increases of wages, but then the times became worse and the men refused to accept the Arbitration Court’s award because these awards were against them. What could the Government do? They could only put a few people in prison. Mr. Millar went on to say in the course of his speech that having studied the effect of legislation in different parts of the world, it appeared to him that the best solution so far as conciliation was concerned was to provide machinery to get both parties affected to come together. One of the chief objects of legislation was to prevent men interfering who had no interest at all in Labour matters except to make trouble, and he was sorry to say, whose one object seemed to be to foment difficulties and troubles. Mr. Merriman went on: Happy South Africa that has not got men whose object is to foment trouble. (Laughter.) Mr. Millar, after alluding to the failure of Conciliation Boards in the past, touched upon the general question, and said that strikes or revolts against decisions of the Court had been rather frequent, and a great cry had been raised throughout the country because there had been strikes. The law was not intended to prevent strikes and never could. The object of the law was to discredit strikes, because they were a national calamity and because boomerang like, they sometimes recoiled and struck the man who had started them. Mr. Merriman, proceeding, said that after reading all these laws he thought that the English system of voluntary conciliation was the best, and an attempt to draw the line too harshly in these matters, which after all were not matters of law and order, because there they could not draw too hard a line, but a question of the contact between man and man, and they should be very careful indeed before they tried to impose penalties and make laws which might appear to interfere with that freedom of contract which was the right of every man in every country. If they wished to get that Bill through, this conciliation matter should be placed on a sound footing. If they wished to do that, he would strongly recommend the Minister to take the Bill to a Select Committee, where they could study the different reports and other legislation in a way they could not do in that House. He wondered how many members who had listened to him had read the Bill throughout. It was difficult to understand, and, in his opinion, it was badly drafted, though, of course, he understood it was a difficult Bill to draft. It was a cumbersome Bill, and it was a Bill, he thought, that would lead to litigation. It would not go through the House, because it was far too complicated. He thought they could carry out what was best for the country by putting conciliation on a sound basis, and by doing that, it would be a sound enough step for the present, and they would do a great deal towards remedial legislation. He did counsel the Minister to adopt the course he had proposed, because it would shorten discussion in that House, lessen acrimonious discussion that was bound to take place, and do a great deal of good for that country.

said that he thanked the right hon. gentleman for expounding the policy of hon. members on the cross-benches in a better way than he could hope to do it, and that was when he was dealing with the Bill itself. He was in accord with the right hon. gentleman when he told them that the basis of society could not be altered while the rifles were in other hands. They on those benches recognised that the rifles were always in the hands of the ruling powers. (An Hon. Member: The land, owner.) If that was so, they proposed one day as workers generally to own the land. (Laughter.) He agreed with the right hon. gentleman when he said that the workers of this country were the natives, and he also wanted to remind the right hon. gentleman that the people who exploited the natives were his friends on both sides of the House. The hon. member for Germiston had clearly set out the position from his point of view, and there was nothing he said which had come as a surprise to them; but he could not follow the hon. member when he said that the hon. member for Jeppe had no desire to make that a workable measure. If they on those benches succeeded in making it a workable measure, he was afraid the Minister of Mines would not recognise the Bill. They disapproved of the whole spirit of the Bill. Then the hon. member for Germiston said that they did not consult a third party—the public— in industrial disputes. A considerable number of the public a few weeks ago expressed themselves, so far as the Transvaal was concerned, as to the quality of the members of the Labour Party and the party generally in that country. Surely that was some indication of what the public thought, and they might be excused if they said that the public leaned rather to the view of hon. members on the cross-benches than the view of the hon. member for Germiston, and so he did not think they need be so solicitous about the public, of which the workers constituted the greater part. He did not think that legislation of this kind was likely to solve industrial questions. To his mind, there was no doubt that Bills of this kind were intended to cripple the efforts of Trade Unions.

The hon. member for Germiston had stated that the attitude of Trade Unions on the Rand towards the mining industry had been a truculent one. Undoubtedly, the Trade Unions of the Rand and South Africa generally had, during the past 12 months shown a more determined opposition to the tyranny of capitalism than they had done here to fore, but he thought the hon. member forgot that Trade Unions had been a factor in the body politic in the various colonies of South Africa for at least a matter of 20 years. Their policy, he thought, could not be said to have been a truculent one. They knew how much love these men had for the officials of the Trade Unions which they now declared they were prepared to recognise, “suitable” Trade Unions, of course. They knew that these men were walking the streets of the Rand and that many of them had gone to Australia. The Minister himself formed part of a Government whose settled policy it was to victimise the members of Trade Unions. In Durban to-day, 82 men were walking the streets, awaiting the pleasure of the Minister of Railways to allow them to go and work on the railways, their only crime being that they had obeyed the mandate of their union. He had no doubt that the hon. member for Germiston was a great authority on why men joined unions and why they did not join unions. He had told them that they would not join the unions, because they were not suitably run, or something to that effect. He (Mr. Andrews) had, in the course of experience, found that the man who would not join the Trade Unions, refused to join, as a rule, not from any very noble or heroic motives. (Labour cheers.) He did not join because he was too mean to pay the money or he was hoping to detach himself from his own class and play the sycophant to the employer to get promotion and a fat billet. He made bold to say that the best class of men were in the unions. That was the statement made by such men as Carnegie and hundreds of great employers all over the world. They agreed that the best men, not all the best men, but on the average the best men, were in the Unions. The hon. member for Germiston had told them that they were too often discussing the affairs of the mining industry. They did not discuss the affairs of the mining industry. What they very often did discuss was the condition of the men on whose backs that mining industry rested. (Hear, hear.) He did not mean the Chamber of Mines or the Corner House or the great financiers, but the men who were working the industry, who were producing the wealth by which the other men were waxing rich. He claimed that they had a right to discuss that.

The hon. member had also spoken about conciliation. Did the hon. member not recollect the time when the miners’ representatives and the representative of the mining houses were brought together not more than two years ago under the Industrial Disputes Act of the Transvaal? What was the result? When the mining representatives got there they would not talk, they would have nothing to do with the men from the mines. What was the good of the hon. member talking about conciliation and bringing the parties together under such circumstances? Before there could be any conciliation, any collective bargaining on an equality, they had got to have the men as well organised and as powerful and as able to resist as they had the employers. The hon. member had also told them that the great success of the Conciliation Act in Canada was in consequence of the fact that there was no political Labour Party there. He did not know, in the first place, that the hon. member was quite correct in saying that there was no political Labour Party in Canada. He did not say they were powerful in the House at present, but that was quite a familiar phenomenon to the people in South Africa. It grew in the country first. He did not think the time was far distant when there would be a considerable Labour Party not only in the country, but also in the House in Canada. The Trade Unions in this country had been told in the Press, from the platform, in this House, and by all kinds of advisers for months past why did not they go in for constitutional means, and here the hon. member for Germiston had told this House, he understood, that it would be a good and proper thing if the right of Trade Unions to vote money for political purposes were taken away.

Did the other side intend to give up political propaganda? Was the Chamber of Mines openly constituted for political purposes? He had a suspicion that that body had a very material influence on politics, and its elder brother, De Beers, had put its finger pretty deeply in the pie in the political history of the Cape. Did the shareholders of De Beers know that some of their money was spent for political purposes ?

De Beers have never spent money for political purposes. It is absolutely incorrect.

The hon. member is hit pretty hard.

No, no. It is a misstatement; it is not true.

I call upon the people of South Africa to say whether I am nearer the mark.

You said that they spent the shareholders’ money for political purposes, and it is not true.

I am asking whether you took a ballot? When a Trade Union want to spend money for political purposes they always take a ballot. The hon. member for Fordsburg laughs.

May I not laugh?

Oh, yes, certainly, but I thought he was inclined to dispute what I said. Continuing, Mr. Andrews said that in the Trade Union constitution it was distinctly laid down that before any money could be voted for political purposes the branches must be consulted and the majority must decide. That was an entirely democratic constitution, and he challenged the hon. member for Germiston to say that all money raised by the Unionists had been obtained on the same democratic basis. The Minister of Mines had stated that the Bill was a practical measure. He (Mr. Andrews) had no doubt it was, and if carried it would have the very practical effect of stultifying the efforts of the Trade Unions, but it would not kill the movement. No matter what was tried to cripple Trade Unionism, it would only divert efforts into other channels or they might go underground entirely.

The men in this country were not built of the stuff to tolerate the kind of Russian methods suggested in the Bill. He would like to say a word or two on the Bill itself. Employees of the Crown and the Government were not to have any part in it, but he did not know they had much to be grieved at thereby. He took it that their Unions were not to be recognised, and it seemed to him to be the beginning of a policy of making organisations of Government servants impossible, if not illegal. Public servants, natives and Indians, were not allowed to be organised or to be recognised as members of Trade Unions. The political rights of public servants already were curtailed, and now their industrial rights were being curtailed. This was a very dangerous policy to deny them many means of obtaining political redress. Of course they would be told that there was special machinery to enable Government servants to obtain redress of their grievances, and also that they had permanency of employment, but they knew the value of that. As to the regulations, he hoped nothing would be done enabling the Government to follow a man from pillar to post and to hunt him out of the country As to the Conciliation Boards, they would do no harm, if they did not do any good. Clause 19—prohibition of any lockout or strike pending arbitration, conciliation, or investigation—was one of the most interesting in the Bill. It provided for a fine of not less than £50 and not more than £250 for inciting or encouraging employees in going or continuing on strike, or inciting or encouraging or aiding any Trade Union or officer thereof in effecting a strike. A man’s presence at a meeting might be sufficient to render him liable to this penalty. Then it was laid down that no strike should be entered into until the majority of the employees had had a ballot. What benefit would it be to any man to belong to a Trade Union if the Bill became law? No union would submit to this, and no Trade Unionist with any self-respect would allow a non-union man to ballot with him whether on a strike or any other subject. (Hear, hear.) That very clause, in his opinion, was sufficient to damn the Bill in the eyes of all Labour men and Trade Unionists in the country. He had gathered from this speech that the hon. Minister would be open to accept some amendment which would give more rights and more inducement for Trade Unionists to take advantage of anything which might be good in the Bill. The Minister was open to conviction, and he (Mr. Andrews) trusted that the policy of taking a ballot of union and non-union men would not be persisted in.

called the attention of Mr. Speaker to there being no quorum in the House.

The hon. member cannot count correctly. The hon. member for George Town may proceed.

said that the whole of that chapter interfered with the rights and constitutions of the Trade Unions. It was ridiculous to say that a Trade Union should not change its name unless two-thirds of the members voted in the majority. If that was the law no union would ever change its name. The same clause also referred to the amalgamation of two unions. It was an absurdity for any Minister to attempt to govern Trade Unions, which had built up their rules as the consequence of many years of experience. The Trade Unions had been of very great benefit, not only to their members, but to society in general, and it was ridiculous for any Parliament to legislate and say exactly how they should be run.

From the point of view of the hon. members of the cross-benches, the whole pivot of the Bill was clause 40, an impossible clause, which provided for a state of affairs which the Trade Unions of Great Britain had fought bitterly, and to a large extent successfully, in recent years. It was quite immaterial whether they started from the point of view as to whether Unions were legal or illegal. If that Bill passed it would be with the whole idea of crippling Trade Unions by attaching their funds. It was most unprecedented and a dangerous policy. After the Taff Yale decision bearing on that point, the whole of the Trade Unions of Great Britain decided for the first time that they would go in for politics. They formed a party of their own, and the Labour Party was born as the result of a policy which was foreshadowed in clause 40 of that Bill. The Taff Yale decision was reversed. Why the Minister had inserted that law into that Bill he (Mr. Andrews) could not understand. Whether a union was registered or not its funds could be attached. What then was the benefit of registration? It was coercion. It was indirect compulsion. They were going to force unions to register whether they liked it or not, seeing that the unregistered union was not exempt from that provision, but it would not have the effect desired. The effect would be to drive the unions into politics more whole-heartedly than ever before. The Bill was designed to throttle any independence a man might have. Clause 40 was quite sufficient to show that the Bill was designed in antagonism to Trade Unions. The Bill was an iniquitous one, and he hoped it would never reach the Committee stage or be passed into law.

said he would not have intervened in that debate had it not been for the unfounded statements made by the hon. member for George Town, that the company with which he (Sir David) was connected was spending the shareholders’ money for political purposes. He felt bound to refute that statement, because the hon. member, when addressing a public meeting, would say that he had made that charge in the presence of a director who did not contradict it. He had said that the people of Kimberley had not a soul to call their own, that they were dominated by De Beers Company.

I deny that.

said that the other day when the hon. member addressed a public meeting in Kimberley, he told the people what a fine lot they were. That was very different from the statements he made in that House. Certainly everybody used their influence in general elections. He used what influence he could to return the man to Parliament who he thought was better than his opponent. They all did that, and he would continue to do it. In every debate they heard from the Labour members something of the result of the Provincial Council elections, but the hon. members on the cross-benches must bear in mind they had not quite conquered the world yet. One objection he had to those hon. members was that they had caused 3,400 men to lose their billets since July. They had produced misery and suffering to thousands and knew at the same time that they were not in a position to find employment for one single individual at £1 a week. They could not help them themselves, and were always condemning men who had sufficient brains and organising power to employ thousands of men on very good salaries. He believed in Trade Unions and he also believed that men were justified in striking when their employers attempted to underpay them or place disabilities upon them. He also supported the men when they stood together for the purpose of bettering their conditions. With regard to the Bill, he did not think it was sufficiently comprehensive. One of its faults was that there was no penalty against the leaders of Trade Unions who, by their inciting speeches, were the cause of nearly all the damage that was done. He was always impressing upon his chauffeur the necessity of being careful when driving, because he (Sir David) was responsible for the acts of his servants. So in the same manner should the Trade Unions be made responsible for the speeches of their leaders. They found the recognised officials of the Trade Unions and the Federation of Trades could make use of the most inciting language which led to disturbances, and yet they were not civilly responsible.

Morally they are.

contended that a Court should be appointed under the Bill to go into the question when the recognised leaders of rade Unions used inciting language and when, through the use of such language, damage was done, then the Trade Unions should be made to pay the extent of that damage—(hear, hear)—and in the event of the Unions not having sufficient funds to pay with, a levy should be made upon the members of those Unions. Just as employers were civilly responsible for the acts of their servants, so should the Unions be responsible for the language used by their leaders. These people had been directly responsible for the expenditure of £300,000 to quell the disturbances in July and January last. Who was going to pay that money? Not those men who caused the disturbance and subsequent damage. If it had not been for the strike leaders there would have been no cause for—

The Income Tax. (Laughter.)

said he objected to be called upon to pay for the damage done by the language of Socialist leaders. It was a case of the guilty getting of scot free while the innocent taxpayer had to pay the expense.

thought some action was necessary in order to put Trade Unions on a proper basis. It was necessary that the minorities in Trade Unions should be protected. In the event of a ballot as to whether the Union should take political action or not, the members who voted against such political action being taken should not be made responsible.

They did not propose that the Unions should not take political action, but they only wanted to do something in order to protect the minorities, and he thought that it would be advantageous to have it in legislation of this sort, because everybody would then feel secure. Continuing, he said that it was interesting to watch the way the ballots had been taken in Great Britain, and added that at present they did not have any security in that matter at all. He believed that the future of industrial peace in that country depended on the organisation of the men and the organisation of the employers, and he did not believe they would get very good organisation on the part of the men, owing to the objection to Trade Unions in the past that there was compulsion about the way they carried on their business. He believed that this was a thoroughly well-meant measure to put Trade Unions on a proper basis. He believed it was necessary to lay down a basis for Trade Unions—lay down how they should carry on their business, and how they should keep their accounts. He did not agree with the right hon. the member for Victoria West when he said the part of the Bill dealing with registration should be cut out. If these Unions were to be founded, it was only right that they should lay down the basis, it they approved of Conciliation Boards, they must have some definite representative on these Boards from the employers and the employees. If they thought the Unions should be represented, why should they complain when the basis of these Unions was laid down? This was a complicated Bill, in which the Government had really put three Bills into one. It was interesting to note the difference between that measure and the old one, and some of the old clauses had been put into the Riotous Assemblies Bill. (Laughter.) He thought that the Bill dealing with Trade Unions should not have anything to do with a Bill relating to the prevention of strikes. With regard to the general policy of the Bill, there was much with which he did not agree, and he thought it might be dealt with in three stages. There was the Conciliation Board. Then there was the second stage, when the strike was imminent, and when the Minister stepped in. Well, he did not think that this was the right point for the Minister to step in. The third stage was when a Dispute Board was formed, and he thought that this was really the time when the Minister should first interfere. It was provided in the Bill that the Government should appoint Industrial Commissioners as might be necessary for carrying out the provisions of the Act and regulations. That, he presumed, only referred to the first two chapters, because chapter 5 appointed a Registrar of Trade Unions.

He probably would be the same official.

Why should he be the same official? It is not clear from this Bill that he is. Proceeding, he said that his scheme, which he put forward with all modesty, was that the Industrial Commissioner should first take action in a dispute before the Government intervened. That principle was followed in Great Britain. If they followed that principle and gave the Industrial Commissioner more power to deal with disputes in their earlier stages, they would get over the difficulty of the Minister being down here in the Cape sometimes, as happened in the Kleinfontein case, for instance. He believed that the legislation, on the whole, was sound, and that it would be in the interests of the country. (Hear, hear.)

said that they had heard a good deal during the last few days about the expenditure in which this country had been involved on account of the industrial unrest. He thought they should ask themselves why had these large sums been expended? Why should this unrest exist? He thought it was their duty to try and find out what were the causes. During a recent visit to the Transvaal one cause had been prominently brought under his notice when he visited the Home for miners phthisis patients and where he found almost forty men who had only a few more months to live. He asked himself the question, was not this one of the great causes of the industrial unrest in this country? Again, he thought another cause could be traced in what they had seen recently in the Transvaal under the Industrial Disputes Act. The Board which had been sitting had granted very substantial increases to workers in the printing industry. The unequal distribution of wealth was, he thought, one of the principal causes of the unrest which existed. He disclaimed any desire on the part of Trade Union leaders to bring about or encourage strikes. But sometimes a strike was the only means of obtaining redress of grievances. Coming to the Bill, Mr. Maginess asked what advantages were to be given to Trade Unions to register. If the Bill were passed the funds of Trade Unions could be grabbed by Government. No Trade Union would tolerate that. Political parties both in England and South Africa in days gone by had taken no notice of Trade Unions which, owing to the apathy of the Government, had been compelled to take political action. (Labour cheers.) He welcomed whole-heartedly the conciliation proposals, but conciliation should be of a voluntary character. As the result of the recent railway strike the Government had victimised a large number of the men, who were now walking the streets waiting on the call of the Minister of Railways to put them back in their employment. They came to him (Mr. Maginess) night after night, asking him when the Minister of Railways was going to take action on their behalf. Many of them who had families were in a state of semi-starvation. Was this the proper time to bring forward a spirit of conciliation when the Government itself was not setting an example as far as these men were concerned? Let the Government lead the way by reinstating these semi-starving men. Hon. members on the cross-benches would support conciliation by all the means in their power. There was a Conciliation Board in Cape Town which had been brought into existence by the master builders of the Peninsula. This Board had avoided two or three strikes, and it was entirely a voluntary body. The temper of the working people of South Africa, however, would not tolerate any repressive measures. If the Minister persisted with the Bill it would bring the sword through the whole of South Africa. He opposed it and strongly supported the amendment.

expressed his disappointment at the reception given to the measure by the hon. members on the cross-benches. If the Government were subject to blame it was for delay in bringing in remedial legislation of that character, and had they not brought it in the hon. members on the cross benches would have been the first to have adversely criticised the Government for their omission to do so. On the whole the Bill was a very fair one, and would undoubtedly improve the conditions of the working-classes. He could not understand the attitude of the Labour members (Labour “Hear, hears.”) They had spoken with two voices. Mr. Alexander went on to say that he thought Civil Servants’ associations should be given an opportunity to register. It had been urged that there was no necessity for registration of Trade Unions. But if they came under the Bill they would be treated as corporate bodies. The only real objection coming from the cross-benches was that Trade Unions were liable to be sued, but under what principle of equity were Trade Unions to be put above the law? The only way to escape actions was to do nothing illegal. Trade Unions could always keep out of the Courts by that. Then they would never be sued. But by putting Trade Unions above the law many citizens would be deprived of their legal remedy. He thought it would be difficult to defend this except on the principle that institutions of this sort should be put above the law and that was not a reasonable principle to carry out. Why should a Trade Union be exempt when even charities were not? That seemed to be the objection that had been taken. Though some things might be made less cumbersome he did not think that just objection could be taken to the Bill. He had heard nothing more undemocratic than the argument of the hon. member for George Town that non-union men should not vote. He was astonished to hear that these unions would not get two-thirds of their members to vote because he always understood that the organisation of these unions was perfect. He was surprised to hear that they did not send ballot papers to members in other parts of the country so that they could vote.

You know nothing about it.

called the hon. member to order.

said when it came to changing the whole constitution of an organisation, it was not too much to ask that two-thirds of the members should have something to say in the matter. He thought the Bill was a fair attempt to meet the present problem in the country, as it would provide Conciliation Boards where they did not exist before, and would give employers and employees breathing space, because the last thing an employer wanted was war with his employees. He hoped the second reading would be carried.

moved the adjournment of the debate.

The motion was agreed to, and the debate adjourned until Wednesday next.