SHEARERS' WAGES

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 208, 18 September 1937, Page 5

SHEARERS' WAGES

Contract Rate of £3 18/a Hundred C0NTRACT0RS, DECISION The decision that £3 13/- a hundred sheep was the only fair and reasonable rate of contract for shearers was reached at a meeting of shearing contractors held in the Labour Party 's room, Hastings. All the most prominent contractors were represented at the meeting, wliich was pvesided over by Mr Bob Tutaki. The meeting fully discussed the contract rate for this year, after which a resolution was carried that £3 18/- a hundred sheep should be fixed and that every contractor- should make a resolute stand against accepting anything less than that amount. There had been considerable trouble in the past, said Mr Tutaki, throngh the contract rate being varied. One farmer would pay one piice, an other less. The only satisfactory basis would be a uniform rate. But the sheepowners had refused to accept any rate stipulated as a minimum. Under the present system of individual bargaining they could gst their shearing done much cheaper. Mr Tutaki also toolc strong exception to the remarks of Mr C. R. Edgecombe, chairman of the Hawke's Bay Provincial Distriet of the Farmers' Union, who, he said, told a meeting at Waipukurau that the present rate of shearing (£1 14/- a hpndred sheep) ' enabled shearers to earn £25 a week. Such a remark was exaggerated and misleading, said Mr Tutaki. No shcarer, no matter #how good he might be, could oarn more than £15 a week as an average for the season — and the season lasted only five weeks. Mr Edgecombe, he pointed out, should not lose sight of the fact tha't the system which, in 1932, fixed the price of shearing at 18/6, was the same as the system now in force. A mutual agreement between the New Zealand Sheepowners' Federation and the New Zealand Workrs' Union fixed a sliding scale which determined the rates of shearing according to the- rise or f all in the price of wool. A rise in the price of wool this year had been responsible for the higher rates paid to shearers, but no one had squealed in 1932 when the shearers were getting only 18/6. It was then difiicult to get a minimum price fixed, although this has now been made possible through the Arbitration Court. "At a Conciliation Council meeting held in Wellington in 1932 the president and secretary of the Sheepowners' Federation were aslied to agree to 18/6 a hundred sheep being th'e minimum rate, but they refused," said Mr Tutaki. "The following day I was appointed to make representations to the then Minister of Labour^ . the Hon. Adam Hamilton. I was introduced tq him by the late Mr H. E. Holland. I urged upon tho Minister the necessity for a minimum, and he was sympathetic and promised to discuss it with the Sheepowners'' Federation. But in the end he had to give way to the federation and leave the shearers to. its mercy. ' '