WORKING SHORT TIME

Hokitika Guardian, 15 February 1926, Page 4

WORKING SHORT TIME

TIMBER MILLS IX THE NORTH AUCKLAND. Eeb. 11.

A number of sawmills in the centre of the Xnrh Island are working short time. This is said to he due first to the curtailing; of building operations because! money is light, and second to overseas. The result has been a reduced demand for Xew Zealand timbers and a number ol sawiniMers in lie King Country and Rangitikei districts have stopped Saturday work, and others are operating only lour days a week. Timber milling is ranked as the most important industry in Xew Zealand outside the primary industries. It is estimated that each timber worker employed represents 40,000 superficial feet a year, and, taking importations of sawn timber last year as 3b,000,000 feet, the effect was to displace nearly nine hundred workmen. According to latest returns sawmilling plants throughout the Dominion have a value of over £5.090.000. The number of men employed in the bush and sawmills is 9435 and wages paid are over (£2,(W0,000. The value of timber imported into the Dominion is £'650.000, and the value of exported timber is £475,00, or £175,000 less than imports. The (duel timbers imported, apart from Australian hardwood, are Oregon cedar and American redwood, all of which come from the Pacific Slopes and are free ol duty.

An effort has been made by American timber men to increase these importations. and recent visits have been paid to New Zealand and Australia for this purpose. The protection desired by mill owners and timber workers here is the imposition of duty, and a joint proposal to this effect, providing for discrimination in favour of Empire trade, is shortly to he made to the Government.