WORST PAID MEN ON SHIPS.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2153, 20 May 1914, Page 3

WORST PAID MEN ON SHIPS.

WIRELESS OPERATORS DEMAND MINIMUM WAGE. Although 'it has not yet come to nn "5.0.5." call (says tho London "Daily News") the wireless operators oil British ships are very dissatisfied with tho scale on which thoy are paid, mid ;t Movement- has been started to demand i minimum fnr» this has been ttHsnceessful. Tha rooently foraiocl trade union, the Assn>eiation of Wireless Telegraphists, has already enrolled three hundred and seventy of the- eight hundred' -and fifty operators at sea.. At tho present time the wireless operator, who is hailed as a hero at times, of disaster at sea, is paid a lower rate than anyone elso on his vessel—even lower thsin trimmers and firemen. After his expensive training li-e receives appointment by the British Jfareoni Co. to a ship as junior operator at one pound a. week, with animal increments of half-a-crown. Senior opera* tors 'are paid froni tiurty-fivc- to jifiyfive smllings <1 wcpk, avid theso afp tiot increased while the mea aro on slioro waiting for their boats te sail. Often, they declare., they have to work and sleep in cabins offering in-ade-quate accommodation, and so damp as sometimes to interfere with the workma of the wireless apparatus. _ The Wirclc-ss Telegraphists' Association have been unsuccessful in gaining recognition from tho British Marconi Co. They demand a minimum wa.se of thirty shiii'incs for junior operators' ami forty-five shillings for senior operators, improved accommodation on board ship where necessary, freedom from the necessity of assisting the purser in eleri-ea-1 Work, and recognition <j.f the association. The general secretory of the association) Mr. E- R. Tucfej told a "Daily News" correspondent in t,ivcr■pool recently thai the profession was at present nothing -mofe than a blindalley occupation.