JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR, THURSDAY APRIL 19TH, 1900 / by Helen Grace

2020: DAY 26

SMH p5

INTERCOLONIAL PROTECTIONIST CONFERENCE.
 p3
THE OPENING MEETING

PROTECTION AND FEDERATION

THE COLOURED LABOUR QUESTION

- speech by EW O'Sullivan apologized for Premier who was president of NSW National Protectionist Union - in Melb for Premier's Conf. 
- risk from cheap Asiatic labour.
- .
‘At Tattersall’s chambers. which for several years has been regarded us the abiding-place of the protectionists of this city, and perhaps of the colony, there occurred yesterday a function as novel as it was important. It was the first conference of delegates from the various protectionist associations and unions in the different colonies yet held on the Australian continent… The Hon. E.W. O’Sullivan (Minister for Public Works) … could see no hope for a new country, especially if it were situated as Australia was, unless it was under the banner of protection. (Cheers) He was quite willing to admit that there was force and depth in the arguments advanced by freetraders from an abstract point of view, and if all the world were on the same plane – if there were in existence the same rates of wages as were paid, say, in China or India, and there was no outside competition. But in the existing conditions the freetraders’ views were simply idle dreams that never could be realised. (Hear, hear.) … Naturally they were all delighted at the prospect of obtaining federation, and with it the higher grounds of Australian nationality, and they were also pleased because it gave them at all events a fair chance of getting a tariff which would protect them against the cheap and coloured labour of other parts of the world. (Hear, hear .) In Queensland black labour was employed in connection with the sugar industry, and the system was not abolished because wealth and vested interests were in favour of it; but when federation would be consummated … he looked forward to the time when they would get a federal tariff, which would mean the enabling of the white men of Australia to compete with the outer world. (Applause) 

Q'land rep. thought Australia a white man's country, but the sugar industry was not yet ready to do away with coloured labour.


BUBONIC PLAGUE
 p5
CASES REPORTED YESTERDAY

PROGRESS OF QUARANTINE AREA WORK …
Ret-catching and destruction are proceeding slowly … For the information of those who desire to make money by rat-catching, it may be mentioned that it is recommended that the bodies be placed in covered cans, so that there may be no need to actually handle them…. Use tongs and drop them into cans filled with disinfectant…

One of the patients at the quarantine hospital was reported yesterday as very ill and another, though not said to be in a bad state, was reported not to be as well us on the previous day In two or three cases there was no change, and all the rest the patients were improving. _


DISCUSSIONS IN THE CITY COUNCIL
SUGGESTION TO QUARANTINE OTHER AREAS
DESTRUCTION OF RATS


HEALTH OF BALMAIN

GARBAGE BOXES FOR BURWOOD

ACTION AT ASHFIELD.
Town Hall wasn't connected to sewer. Decision to expedite this in view of pressure being put on property owners to connect.
The Plague in Capetown - smallpox 

281-5 Kent St, Sydney, 1900 - Source: State Library of NSW

281-5 Kent St, Sydney, 1900 - Source: State Library of NSW