asked the Government: “Will it, with a view of removing a monopoly and putting an end to the present strike between labour and capital, and the disaster, losses, misery, and suffering contingent thereon, take into consideration the purchasing by the colony of the Union Steamship Company’s fleet of steamers?”
The reply he received from the Government was that “no doubt a great deal might be said upon the subject; the Government, however, are not at present prepared to take any such action as suggested in the question.”
The steamship monopoly led him on to the coal mines. He asked where, if the coal supply continued to be monopolised, the colony was to obtain its motive power, and what was to become of its manufactures. “It is quite evident to me,” he said with emphasis, which probably was not noticed at the time, but which is clear enough in the light of after events, “that the State should step in and do something.” That “something” is now represented by State coal mines, which he established on the coalfields of the South Island, and which are supplying coal to consumers in several centres of population.
The Government endeavoured to arrange a conference, as directed by Parliament on the motion of Liberal members, but the employers’ associations refused to be represented unless the unions admitted the right of employers to retain the “free” labour engaged during the strike, and the right to employ “free” labour or union labour indiscriminately, and also agreed that unionists should work with free men. The unions could not concede this, and the conference, when it was held, was between twenty union delegates and the Hon. G. McLean, representative of the Union Steamship Company, who would listen to nothing but unconditional surrender, which the unionists had to accept.
The public had concentrated its attention on the strike. For a few weeks the general elections, now quite close, had been forgotten, but no sooner had the strike died out than the public mind rebounded back to the political contest. Defeated in the strike, the unionists rushed to the electoral offices to enrol themselves on the parliamentary rolls. Political associations were formed in all parts of the colony, and politics filled the air.
