World of Labour June 22, 1895.

*THE WORKER*

BRISBANE, JUNE 22, 1895.

The World of Labour.

IF a poor man or his family use an hospital the wealthy do not forget to remind him of the charity he is receiving.

ENQUIRIES for “Merrie England” are informed that all copies in Brisbane have been sold, but another supply is expected next week.

THE Pacific Coast Seamen's Union in California has lifted the wages of seamen £1 per month during last May, and in the face of big odds, too.

THE labourers employed at Avon Downs station have been successful in resisting a reduction in wages. Work is now in full swing at 30s. per week.

IN Melbourne coal from Newcastle, New South Wales, is selling at from 13s. 6d. to 16s. 6d. per ton. In Sydney the same coal is selling at from 20s. To 22s. per ton.

SIXTEEN thousand and fourteen Chinese sailors have been accounted for during the last seven years as having arrived and sailed in boats trading with N.S.W. ports.

THE Talbot Council, Victoria, have decided that the minimum rate for labourers shall be 7s. per day, and for man, horse and dray, 10s. per day.

IN the annual celebration by the Journeymen Butchers' Association of Melbourne of their Wednesday half holiday upwards of 1100 butchers' carts took part in the procession.

KATANDRA station shearing, 56 shearers (10 Sydney men, rest local). Manuka station also shearing, with 30 men on the board. Hands are being taken for Vindex. - S.B.S.

THE Chief Secretary of Victoria has promised a deputation from the Tailors' Union that the Government intend to amend the Factories Act this session with a view of suppressing the evils of sweating.

In the manufacture of cigarettes in Melbourne there is such a monopoly that the investment of £10,000 in one business realises £22,000 per annum profit. This is given on the authority of the Commissioner for Customs.

“MONALITE” advises men not to go to Monal Creek expecting to find employment. There are only sixteen wages men engaged on the field, and those who are working their own claims are not, as a whole, earning a fair living.

THE cost of production in Melbourne of a case of cigarettes, containing 1000, is about 9s; the selling price at the factory is 17s; the retailing price to the public, at the rate of 3d. for every 10, is 25s., or nearly 200 per cent on cost of production.

THE names of 1794 ordinary clergymen, 4 deans, 28 canons, 14 archdeacons and 15 bishops appear on the share list of the Great Eastern railway, England. The same company works many of its employe's fifteen and sixteen hours on the Sabbath day.

ACCORDING to the Commercial Travellers' Association 62 towns in Victoria close for half holidays on Wednesday afternoons, 22 on Thursday afternoons, and three on Saturday afternoons. In Melbourne the butchers close on Wednesdays for half a day.

SYMPATHISERS with the union prisoners now at St Helena are informed that the grand art union in connection with 12 horses and gear, the property of the union prisoners, is still open. Tickets, 5s. each, are obtainable from W. Kewley, secretary A.W.U. Longreach.

IT was stated in the Victorian Assembly that some coal lumpers on the railways were earning not more than 1s. 4d. per day, and consequently lived more like beasts than human beings, because compelled to sleep under the platforms where they worked. Inquiry was promised.

THE New South Wales Political Labour Federation are negotiating with the independent Labour members with a view to bringing about a reconciliation between them and the Solidarity Party. For the sake of the Cause, the WORKER wishes the Federation every success.

AT a public meeting held in the Sydney Town Hall Prior Vaughan unfolded his scheme for the “Betterment of the Masses in England,” and £250 was subscribed at the meeting. The betterment of the masses can never be fully accomplished until governments go the right way to work about it by organising industry.

A VERDICT of “Not guilty” has been returned in the cases of Richard Leighton and Peter Curran, two prominent unionists who were charged with being implicated in improvising a cannon out of cast-iron water pipes, and which was fired in the direction of the blacklegs' camp at the time of the strike at Minnie Colliery, N.S.W.

THE majority of the drapery establishments in Adelaide are demanding, in conjunction with the Retail Assistants' Association, that early closing shall be made compulsory by Act of Parliament. This has been brought about by the greed of one or two firms who persist in remaining open after the hour decided upon by mutual agreement.

A WEEK of self-denial for the Melbourne Hospital has just concluded. As usual, the workers had to suffer the denial. If you deny yourself milk, tobacco, meat, or fish for a week you may be able to shine as philanthropist, but you are forcing the actual worker in these industries into idleness, and idleness, where low wages rule, means starvation.

WHILE the workers of Melbourne are subscribing their pennies and threepenny pieces out of their shillings to Melbourne Hospital Self-denial Fund we do not find the millionaires putting up their pounds out of the unearned increment which they control. Wealthy men get all the credit of the amount that may be contributed while poverty does most of the contributing.

AS evidence for the necessity of an early closing law, an agreement was entered into by the Adelaide shopkeepers to close early and which was maintained until quite recently when a large drapery firm broke away from the custom. The Shop Assistants' Association, recognising how unfair the competition would be to the other shopkeepers, freed them all from the agreement; but, to their credit be it said, nearly all of them kept closed and declared that it was necessary for an early closing law to be passed in the interest not only of the shop assistants but fair-minded employers as well.

CONTRAST the conduct of the boot trade manufacturers of Adelaide with those of Brisbane. The latter are at daggers drawn with their workmen and refuse a conference, whilst the Adelaide employers gathered round a friendly conciliatory board with the representatives of the men's union suggest that the union appoint delegates to proceed to Melbourne with credentials from the board and inspect the Melbourne factories and latest machines, &c., &c., after their return to Adelaide to draw up and submit a statement to the Board of Conciliation. This was agreed to by the workmen's union, and its delegates are now in Melbourne on the tour of inspection. Queensland employers, by their persistent refusals to meet the representatives of the workmen's unions, compare most unfavourably with many employers in other provinces. Their unbending attitude in all labour disputes is at last beginning to make many people think that the reason why they refuse to meet workmen in conference is because they despise them.