A PROTEST.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1150, 10 June 1911, Page 4

A PROTEST.

GROCERS AND HOLIDAYS,

A well-attended meeting of the city and suburban master grocers was held yesterday in the rooms of the Employers' Federation. The demand of the Labour Department that employers should pay overtime to assistants who wcro required to work 011 the Wednesday afternoon preceding the lung's llirt'liday was discussed. The general feeling of those present was one of resentment at the attempt of tlio Department to break down a custom that has throughout the Dominion been recognised by the Department, the unions of workers, and the employers for the past ten or twelve years, being tlio period during which Arbitration Court awards affecting the grocery trade havo been operating in the Dominion. The meeting unanimously adopted a resolution recommending master grocers not to pay overtime for work done 011 . tlio afternoons of May 31 and June 21, until tlio test case to be brought' by the Labour Department has been decided by the Arbitration Court'. Tll connection with tho observance of holidays during Coronation week, it was explained that if full ofTcct wcro given to holiday provisions, grocers' shops would have to close 011 Wednesday nt 0110 o'clock until Saturday morning. The following resolution was unanimously adopted:— "We, the master grocers of - AYellincton city and suburbs present at this meeting, hereby determine to open our shops for business on June 22 next (Coronation Day), and urgo other master grocers to adopt the samo course, unless provision is made by Government for the observance of tlio Prince of Wales's Birthday 011 .Tune 22. This resolution is adopted by way of protest arainst the holiday muddlcment repeatedly experienced by shopkeepers." It wa« si Med at the mcetini? that th# master bakers and probablv the master butchers of tho city would adopt the same course.