UNREST AT MANGAHAO.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 2388, 4 February 1922, Page 3

UNREST AT MANGAHAO.

BALLOT TAKEN YESTERDAY. TUNNELLERS AT AY STRIKE. Smouldering dissatisfaction with the new rates of pay, which have been reduced in common with those of other Government workers, broke out in a flame of protest among the men employed on the hydro-electric scliemp at Alangahno yesterday. The trouble started in the morning, when delegates from the Afangaliao section met the Arnpeti workers at the latters’ camp, and a combined stop-work meeting'was held. . Several speakers addressed the meeting, and plenty of “plain talk” was indulged in. The upshot of this preliminary assembly was that another combined meeting.was held in the afternoon, when a strike ballot was taken. The result was not announced, but advices received by the Manawatu Times from an official source point to the probability that the outside 1 men will accept the new conditions. Considerable apprehension, however, is expressed at the more truculent attitude of the tunnellers.

The men of the Alangaoue camp, which is the one nearest to Shannon, will conduct a stop-work ballot this morning, and the results of both will be announced together. The outside labourers, who were formerly receiving 15s a day, have been reduced to 14s, while many of the men .employed on the mining and damming operations are on contract.