NO BREACH OF AWARD

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 68, 17 September 1930, Page 13

NO BREACH OF AWARD

RELIEF WORKS AM). WAGES

Recently the Labourers' Union pro: eeeded against the City Council, claimJ ing a penalty for an. alleged* breach of [ award in a case where four relief workers were transferred from Miramar avenue, where formation, and widening ! work was being done, to the Palmer Head quarry, where it was contended the men should be paid award rates of wages. Stating in his opinion no breach had been proved, Mr. J. S. Barton, S.M., gave judgment to-day for I the City Council. : "Ie my opinion, it is not possible for me to lay down any hard-and-fast rule or to enunciate a principle that will govern this and other cases," Mr. Barton said. "Each ease must be decided according to its own special circumstances. lam satisfied, however, that the term 'relief work,' which in this case is specified in the special order as. being 'widening and formation work on certain streets,' should and does include the winning and transport of the necessary materials. . . In the present case. I am fully satisfied that the work done; by Lees and his fellow relief-workers was necessarily incidental to and part of .the. .relief works they were engaged oh; that they never would have been put on to work at the quarry in question if they, had not been engaged as relief workers, and that the whole result of their work there was used for the benefit of the relief works they ' and their fellow - relief-workers were engaged on." At the hearing Mr. J. Lockie (Assistant City Solicitor) appeared for the City Council, and Mr. P. M. Butler, secretary, for the union.