Mr Withy one of the Auckland M.H.E.'s, in his speech to his constituents, referred to the rate of wages of the railway servants. He said he came now to a point upon which many of them were sensitive — that of the railway wages, and as to whether it acted as a standard. The secretary of the amalgamated Society of Eailway Servants, writing to the commissioners, etated :—": — " It must be apparent that a reduction of wages in so large a Govern ment department will act also as a precedent in reducing wages generally throughout the colony." He (Mr Withy) was of the same opinion as in 1888—that the railway servants should not be paid more than the fair market average rate.- He disclaimed any enmity to railway men, but he had no pretence of posing' as a working man's friend. He did not believe in any man he had ever met who had posed as the working man's friend* If it was true that the reduction of the wages of the railway men would result in a reduction of outside wages, then it must also be true that if the railway wage were kept up the outside wage also ought to be kept up, and also if one were raised the other should be raised. But what was the fact ? Keeping up the railway wage had not kept up the wage outside. Nofc only had a great reduction come in the rates paid outside, but a large number had not been able to get work at all, and they were told that 9000 people had emigrated from New Zealand. Mr Withy argued at further length to show that the maintenance of the railway wage had not, as a matter of fact, and could not, as a nratter of argument, keep up outside wages.
