DRIVERS' DISPUTE

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 111, 4 February 1919, Page 4

DRIVERS' DISPUTE

EMPLOYEES APPLYING TO THE COUBT.

Owing to the failure of the negotiation* at the recent conference ■ between the employers of drivers and the New Zealand Drivers' Federation, thp employers have decided to cite the several unions before the Arbitration. Court in all the industrial districts in New\ Zealand.. Some of the applications have already l been filed, and all of them will be filed in the oourse of a very little time._ Mr. Parlane, seoretary of the Drivers' Federation, explained yesterday that since the drivers had refused the written offer made to them by the employers after the recent conference between the parties, the matter.had been in the' 'hands of the Transport Workers' Advisory Board. "In my opinion," 6aid Mr. Parlane, "our demands wens-most reasonable, and it is to me almost unthinkable that an agreement should not havft been reached. I believe that.if a secret) ballot upon the acceptance or rejection of our demands were taken among the emplovers of drivers in Wellington we should find that they would be accepted. While we are asking for only .£3 10s. per week for single-horse, and 53 ISs. for drivers of more than one horse, quite a number of Wellington employers are paying their men M per week.' A mass meeting of drivers will be held to-night at is o'clock in the Alexandra Hall, Abel Smith Street, to further con. s|der the dispute.