Carpenters Walk Off Marsden Pt. Project

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31087, 16 June 1966, Page 3

Carpenters Walk Off Marsden Pt. Project

(New Zealand Press Association) WHANGAREI, June 15. About 100 carpenters walked off the Marsden Point power project at 5 p.m. today on instructions from the national executive of the Carpenters’ Union.

They are protesting the use of labour only contracts on such projects.

The Auckland secretary of the union (Mr A. Russ) said today that negotiations on the labour-only system had been held between the national executive and the Government

The labour-only contract at Marsden Point is for the building .of the permanent village for the power station.

The industrial relations officer for the construction consortium, Fletcher, Downer, Wilkins and Davies (Mr T. E. Skinner) said the union’s action was an endeavour by the union to bring pressure on Paramount Homes, the contractor for the permanent village. Mr Skinner said the consortium had nothing to do with building the village.

The contract for its construction, as in similar projects elsewhere, had been let to the Government by the Ministry of Works.

•■There is nothing we can do about the matter,” Mr Skinner said. “This has come at a crucial time and has taken us completely by surprise. “The first we heard of the walk-out was just after 2 o’clock this afternoon. “In fact we have been taking on carpenters as hard as we could all day. “The walk-out could have an extremely serious effect on the project,” Mr Skinner said. If carpenters were off the job more than four or five days it could become necessary to lay off some sections of the labour force. Mr Skinner said it seemed unfair that carpenters on the power station project should be called on to sacrifice their savings when they were not directly involved in the building of the permanent village on a labour-only contract basis. He said the consortium was considering its legal position and had notified the Labour Department.

The national secretary of the Carpenters’ Union (Mr W. F. Molineux) said in Wellington tonight that the carpenters at Marsden Point had decided three months ago to cease work if labour-only contracts were introduced.

“Every avenue has been explored in an effort to resolve this problem and prevent stoppage of work,” he said. “Representations were made to the Minister of Works (Mr Allen), who was sympathetic to the union’s proposal that contractors to the Government should be prohibited from sub-letting the work on a labour-only basis but the proposal was rejected by the Cabinet at its meeting on Monday. “Government contracts already contain a provision that work shall not be sub-let without the approval of the Ministry of Works, but this has been ignored at Marsden Point, both by the main contractors and the Ministry of Works.”