WAITERS AND COOKS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1123, 10 May 1911, Page 9

WAITERS AND COOKS.

» THE HALF-YEARLY MEETING. A*t th'o "hh'lf-yertrly meeting of the Cores' and Waiters' Union, the secretary (Mr. E. J. Carey) reported that 177 new members had been admitted during the past six months. The'cash balance in hand amounted to ,£177 lis. lOd. The concession of a weekly half-holiday was obtained for members of the union recently, but' it appears that under the Shops and Offices Act Amendment, an employer and employee may enter into an agreement by which the latter may agree to take tho accumulated half days at the end of three months, instead of taking his half-day each week. Some employers, it is alleged, have at the end of tho term named, handed their men tho monetary equivalent of tho holiday, the employee thus being deprived of his leave. This matter was discussed at some length. It was alleged that several cases had been reported whore employees had been dismissed just before the accumulated holiday was due. It was stated that in or.e case the proprietor of a hotel had approached some of his employees and had induced them to agreo to a neriod holiday. A number of the men in this hotel "were against being parties to an infringement of the half-holiday principle, and as the men who had been approached did not care to go against the employer's wishes there was dissension amongst tho ste.fi. It was resolved that notice of .the termination of the agreeTmnt- between tho men and tho hotelkeeper should be given, as provided by the Act, and in keeping with the opinion •of the maiority of ('he members of the union. Tho ca'<e is to be brought under the notice of tho labour Department as the union has no power under the Shops nnd Offices Act to take rases for breaches of the Act before the Court.