19 APRIL 1924, Page 2

for houses—the. shortage of them is_a national-scandal- and yet the

unions have steadily set their:faces. against any increase of workers except on the unions' own terms. Under the proposed scheme.it will take some time for the apprentices to become skilled, and . even when they are finished workmen.there will not be enough of them. Mean- while the great army of unemployed still walks the streets, and the production of houses is miserably slow. Here is a plain issue between the needs of the nation and the interests of a class. It .is obvious that in a country where real democratic principle prevailed, and where there was less sectionalism and less selfishness, the unemployed in thousands would be turned on at once to remedy the shortage of houses. Houseless and workless men are alike being sacrificed to an aristocracy of Labour.