DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1546, 16 September 1912, Page 4

DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR.

ATTAINS ITS JIAJOBITI'

This year mnrks the attainment of the Labour Department's majority and a short historical review of its organisation and growth is given in the annual report presented to Parliament on Saturday. Under the title "Bureau of luchistries,'" the Department commenced its work in June, 1891, under the charge of Sir. Edward Tregear, who retired from the position of secretary in February, 1911. Of the officers appointed to the .Department shortly after its inception only four wcro on the staff when tho report was compiled—Mr. John Lomas, the present secretary; Mr. James Shanaghan, who joined in 1892, and '.has siuce retired from y>e position of inspector at Auckland; Sir. P. W. Rowley, deputy-chief inspector (joined 1893); and Mr. J. W. Collins, Bccountaiv , ; (joined 1894). Tho staff of threo in 1891 has grown to 88 in 1912, and the functions of tho Department havo eilormously increased. Its chief work on establishment was to deal with tho "unemployed" difficulty, which at that timo was most pressing in all tho larger towns. To-day this work is an important branch, but tho duty-of administering the labour laws has formed the chief responsibility of the Department. "In surveying the twenty-one years' history of tho Department," Mr. Lomas writes: "I look back upon a record of great and lasting work accomplished by tho operation of the humanitarian laws administered by the Department and tho outstandn? feature of all is the total abolition of sweating of the workers and a recognition, hard won perhaps, from' both employers and workers' that each has gained some mutual benefit by the operation of tho labour laws of New Zealand."