Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-05-26
BIG FIGHT IN SYDNEY
LIVELY CONTEST PROMISED IN
FALL OVER LICENSE.


Special CaheSram to The Star.
SYDNEY, May "a battle royal is
promised in Sydney in the latter months
of the year, when the first local option vote
will be taken concurrently with the polling
in the state general election. Even now
the campaign has begun, the two extreme
pTties-those who are bent on destroying
the liquor trade and those who equally
determined to maintain it-bcing already
arraigned against each other. Both are
trying to move the moderates, with WHOM
no doubt the decision will really rest. The
local option act of 1919 provides for a local
option vote on % the continuances of the
licenses; (2) reduction; ca abolition The
anti-linuor party is strenuously working
for the abolition of ucaase, While its
opponents are demanding the rCopening of
the public houses on Sunday during
tain hours of the day. The latter party
mas already issued a manifesto ana has
crcular.zed every license in the state.
1t is interesting to get the view of the
Asiatic in Australia on the immigration,
laws that prevent the coming of his
brethren. One of the hindu hawkers TO be
seen in Melbourne was lately persuaded TO
talk on this subject, ana it was found
that he vas delighted with the restrictions.
TOO many come from India he said,
take away my money He complained
that before the commonwealth b. gan to
assist him and his brethren in their mo-
nopoiy Of the peddlinS trade it was hard
to keep competitors from coming to
Australian shores. "S'osing,' he said, me
write home to my cousin and say, This
good country, make plenty money he say,
My word, l go there too S'osinS | write,
This country dam bad, no money here he
say, My word my cousin very much dam
liar 1 come out that country queek. "
Compulsory Arbitration.
Compulsory arbitration as a means of
ind
severe blow from the strike of butchers at
wellington. For some years new differ
ences between employers and employed in
New Zealand have been settled by the state
in the arbitration court, whose award is
binding on the parties under penalties
long as the men are in combination
trace union. AS it happens. the CRISIS has
come without waiting for turn in the
tide of prosperity. The straightforward in
the Wellington district stock yards have
struck for more wages and got them; and
with that full faith in state arbitration has
in moment become thing of the past.
The strike occurred among butchers en-
ployed by couple of firms who export
frozen mutton on a large scale, and the time
was well chosen, for, owing to a scarcity
of grass, the farmers were pouring their
sheep into the yards of the exporters and
the position of the companies was hope
Large fiocks of sheep were confined in pad
docks with little feed and every days de-
lay meant that the animals were going
back, while there was even some danger in
their actual starvation unless fodder was
procured at heavy cost.
At this moment the men discovered that
the wages they received under an award
of the arbitration court were too small,
and demanded an immediate increase of
70 per cent, and left work when it was re-
fused. They left themselves open to penal
ties OF SOB each by their actions. and officers
were sent from the ministry of labor to
give them warning, but they persisted in
the course they have laid down for them
selves, and the meat companies were COM
PEELED to compromise with an increase of
pay amounting to Is per cent. The general
impression Is that it will be difficult, If
not impossible, to exact from the men the
penalties prescribed by the law. If they
refuse to pay they may be sent to prison,
but whether 1t will be found eXpedient to
send a couple of hundred men to Jail for
an ofense of this nature remains to be
seen. Still less does it seem feasible to deal
with two or three thousands in this fashion
if there were strike of this kind on a
larger scale