The masters, it is maintained, have no hostility to Trade
Unions properly conducted, but decline to recognize the London Building Industries Federation—consisting of representatives of the eleven largest Unions connected with the building industry—because of their Syndicalist policy of the sympathetic strike. They further maintain that the recent ballot was not bond fide, many of the voters being ignorant of the terms proposed by the masters and approved by their own represen. tatives, while only 27,000 voted out of about 150,000 Trade Unionists employed in the building industry in London. An official statement issued by the Master Builders' Association on Wednesday night discloses the latest demands of the Trade Unions concerned in the lock-out. These include advances in wages for all grades and a refusal to submit disputes to conciliation. A conference between the Executive Council of the National Federation of Building Trade Employers and the Councils of some of the Unions concerned in the dispute has been fixed for Monday next, but none of the London officials will be present. Failing a settlement, the members of the Employers' Federation will be asked to ballot on the proposal to order a national lock-out.
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