THE MILTON POTTERY WORK.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2714, 20 December 1882, Page 3

THE MILTON POTTERY WORK.

[press association telegram.] DUNEDIN, December 19,

An open verdict was returned by the jury which investigated the recent fire at the Milton pottery. The “ Bruce Herald ” gives the following particulars about the industry" The latest outcome of the fire at the Milton pottery is very disheartening to all interested in the progress of the industry. The company is to be placed in liquidation, and the directors have decided to recommend the shareholders that the assets bo turned over to them in the shape of paid-up shares in a new company. The resolutions to place the company in liquidation did not arise entirely through the loss sustained by the fire, although, had it not been for that calamity it is not likely such a step would have been decided upon. To show the position of affairs, we may mention that two years ago, whoa the company commenced the manufacture of white ware, prices were settled .upon a satisfactory basis with the men then employed, and a year afterwards at Martenmas, according to a Staffordshire custom, a new arrangement was made at a small advance, and the men were perfectly satisfied and content. Disaffection has, however, been imported with the now hands lately arrived. The agreement made by the manager with these men at Home was that they were to receive from 20 to 25 per cent, above Staffordshire prices, and a firm was mutually agreed upon whose tariff was to form the basis of their scale of payment; hut two or throe of these last arrivals speedily showed a spirit of discontent, and held meetings and consultations which culminated the day before the fire in a demand for a rise in prices, which would have brought them up to about VO per cent, above the Home rates. The manager reasoned with them, and pointed out that they could import at that figure, and if the men received an advance of 70 per cent., and the cost of other labor was three times as high as at Home, and other expenses proportionately greater, how could they compete with the Home market, but the men would not listen to reason. Then came the fire, and thou the end, or the beginning of the end. It may also he mentioned that it was stipulated that, in the event of the men in one branch of the ■ trade striking, the agreement with the whole was nullified. It will thus be seen that these two or throe men have not only thrown themselves out and rendered themeelvos ineligible to claim compensation, but they have placed the imported hands in the same fix. This being the case, the directors felt that they could not be justified in incurring a large expenditure when so little reliance could be placed upon the men, and we are informed that it was on this ground, more than any other, that the decision was arrived at to liquidate the company. We have foreborne comment upon the above facts, but simply place before the public a plain statement of the circumstances which have led up to the present unfortunate state of affairs. Unless confining their operations to coarse ware, the manager considers that it would be folly to start again without erecting a three-storey building, with all modern conveniences, to contain the plant, and this could not be done under from £,7000 to .£IO,OOO. By the stoppage of the pottery works many of the hands are left in a state bordering upon destitution, and something must be done to relieve their more immediate necessities. Th*se in the greatest need are the recent arrivals, but nearly all arc in great difficulties.”