cancellations, dissolutions or amalgamations and the year closed with a total of 284 registered organizations of which 206 were workers' unions. Twelve further applications for registration, three from employers and nine from workers, were in hand at the end of the year. The applications from workers include three break-away organizations of workers who have become dissatisfied with the excessively political character of existing unions.
Another year's work has only served to show that development towards anything like sound trade unionism is still impeded by many of the failings mentioned in the previous report.
In many unions members are still too ready to leave everything to officials, who in their turn tend to leave affairs in the hands of paid clerks. Finance has proved to be particularly difficult. While it is true that increasing unemployment has made the regular collection of contributions difficult, so that many unions could only just balance income and expenditure, at the other end of the scale certain well-to-do organizations have been found to have spent money lavishly on inessentials such as entertain- ment, without any attempt at building up reserves or giving real benefits to members. A number of unions did, however, follow the advice of the department to have their financial statements prepared by professional auditors. This step has been useful in producing clearer accounts than in previous years, but unfortunately some accounts were set out in a form too complicated to be understood by the union officials themselves, to say nothing of the ordinary members. Towards the end of the year the Accountant General and the Director of Audit kindly gave the benefit of their advice in the preparation of new model accounts, which will be distributed to unions for their guidance.
The department is also indebted to the authorities of Hong Kong University, who undertook the organization of a short course of lectures on trade unionism at the University during two weeks of December and provided two of the lecturers. This course was the first of its kind in the Colony and was designed for officials of such English-speaking organizations as the Teachers' Association and the Chinese Civil Servants' Association and welfare officers of large industrial concerns. The subjects dealt with were trade union law, the administration of trade unions, collective bargaining and negotiation and, in particular, trade union finance.
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During the year many defects in the present Trade Union Ordinance became apparent and preparations for extensive revision are in hand.
In May the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions organized at Karachi the first Asian Trade Union Conference. The local federation known as the Hong Kong and Kowloon Trades Union
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