Carpenters and Joiners.

Gisborne Times, Volume VII, Issue 372, 22 March 1902, Page 2

Carpenters and Joiners.

BRANCH FORMED AT GISBORNE. A meeting of the Gisborne carpenters and joiners was held last night'in the Wesley schoolroom for the purpose of forming a branch of the Amalgamated Society, of Carpenters and Joiners. There was a large attendance of the local joiners. Mr Tyson, delegate from Auckland, addressed the meeting. He pointed out that the Society was world-wide, and that its membership stood at 58,000. The accumulated capital in property stood at £2,178,000, and its floating funds from branch to branch stood at £178,000. In such a society he wished every carpenter to become a, member. The benefit of this society was second to none in the world. It gave its members unemployed benefit, sick benefit, tool benefit, and also it competed with Mr Seddon’s Government—it gave its members an old age pension. They were combined to protect and not injure. They did not come to do harm to the trade in Gisborne, but rather to put it on a better footing, and to uphold it as an old and honored profession, of which they were all members. There were times when men had to go from one place to another, and it was then they felt the right hand of fellowship extended to them. It did not matter to what part of the world they went to they would find branches of the society even in Pretoria, and other places in the Transvaal. They must also remember that under the existing labor laws of New Zealand the question of

strikes was for ever settled, and it behoved them as thinking men to grasp the law, and not allow any one party to say what conditions they should work under, as it was possible for seven men under the Act to form a Union, and draw up a working statement to be taken before the Board or Court of Arbitration. Therefore it behoved them as workers to join the Society, and. arrange with their employers upon a fair basis what should be the working rules- of the town of Gisborne- The present Government, he said, had done much for the workers of New Zealand, but they never in-

tended that the worker or employer should use the labor laws to the detriment of the community, but with discretion to the benefit of all “ I am sure,” continued the speaker, “ that the worker will use that discretion in Gisborne as far as the employers are concerned. I will conclude with the hope that the branch will be a credit- to the great body of which it is now part, and that its members will uphold the old and honored profession of which we are all I members. I would further point out to the members that they, need not be afraid to join the Union, for they are protected by the law. Paragraph 100 of the Aot says that until a final settlement is come to between each party no employer shall discharge his workmen, or do anything directly or indirectly against the Union or its members to injure them in any form, and that employers must carefully observe this provision under a penalty not exceeding £so.’i The branch then went- into its ordinary business, when a large number of nety members joined.