N.Z. Manufacturer Looks At U.K. Industrial Scene

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31121, 26 July 1966, Page 11

N.Z. Manufacturer Looks At U.K. Industrial Scene

A Christchurch manufacturer, Mr R. H. Stewart, reported from London yesterday that he was amazed to find that for certain classes of skilled men the wages being paid in the United Kingdom were substantially in excess of wages being offered in New Zealand.

“I can understand the pressure managements in Britain are under to increase wages i without any further work beI ing given,” said Mr Stewart.

Mr Stewart, governing director of P.D.L. Industries, Christchurch, is at present investigating manufacturing overseas.

He said in a special report to “The Press” that all manufacturlng units he had so far visited in the United Kingdom were short of labour and were constantly being upset by strikes and “go slows." Mr Stewart said that in his last three weeks in England, it was impossible not to be fully aware of the present difficult economic position that the United Kingdom was going through.

“These circumstances are no different, except that they are on a larger scale, from those in New Zealand, and in my opinion the balance of payments crisis in both countries is creating a situation w

that is fraught with tremendous possibilities of upheaval,” said Mr Stewart. Mr Stewart said that British Labour M.P.s and the Government itself, appeared to accept the fact that unemployment must be created in order to dampen down the demand for higher and higher wages due to shortage of labour.

New Zealand manufacturers, said Mr Stewart, would do well to consider that England did not have an export incentive policy or any particular policy to the extent that New Zealand had for this purpose.

“Manufacturers in England disagree strongly with the selective employment tax, which they state will be difficult to administer and will not achieve the object for which it was set up,” said Mr Stewart.

“It has been suggested that a flat poll tax should be introduced based on the number of people employed in any company in order to create redundancy of those staff members and employees not virtually necessary for the company’s need. “This type of tax would, it is said, release more people for those companies which are now short of workers." Mr Stewart said there was a campaign getting under way in Britain now to buy British. He said that over recent years the constant pressure by unions in the United Kingdom for increased wages without any effort to increase productivity been a major

factor in the present serious situation. “We in New Zealand should very carefully study the circumstances which brought England to this situation,” said Mr Stewart. “The British Prime Minister (Mr Wilson), though an able administrator, seems to have the bad luck to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“His Inability to satisfy the extremely powerful trade unions is causing him to make decisions, particularly those of appeasement, which have not been to England’s benefit and in the long run, not to the benefit of the union members.”