AUSTRALIAN LABOUR

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19473, 7 May 1925, Page 9

AUSTRALIAN LABOUR

WIDESPREAD DISCONTENT. SHEARERS DEMAND SUBSTANTIAL INCREASES. Press Association —By Telegraph—Copyrigh* SYDNEY, May 6. The Australian Workers’ Union lias issued an official statement that unless substantial increases are made in the present rate of remuneration the shearers and other workers in the pastoral industry will refuse to sign on during the coming season. There was widespread discontent thus season, as the Federal rate was 7s below the Queensland rate under the State award. The union has prepared demands for presentation to the Arbitration Court asking for £3 per 100 for flock sheep, with proportionate increases in all other piece rates. The present rate, except in Queensland, is 38s. For shed hands the claim is £6 and keep. The rate at present is £3 15s lOd and keep. The secretary of the Grazier’s Associaton said he did not expect trouble. He was quite prepared for men were now signing on without hesitation for the early sheds. HOTEL EMPLOYEES’ DISPUTE. SERIOUS TROUBLE AT PERTH. PERTH, May 6. The dispute between the Hotel, Restaurant, and Club Catering Employees’ Union and the employers, as a result of the refusal by the latter to approve of the insertion in a now agreement of a specified preference to unionists clause, which they regard as an attempt to enforce job control, is assuming serious proportions. Despite the Arbitration Court’s injunction ordering them back to work, the cm ployeos here refused to resume. The barmaids and barmen have now ceased work in sympathy. A majority of the hotels are closed. The brewery employees axe holding a stop-work meeting to-day. It is expected that they will bo brought into the dispute. CAMPING AT CANBERRA. WORKMEN NOT SATISFIED. SYDNEY, May 6. (Received May 6, at 9.45 p.m.) Twelve-hundred workmen, employed on Federal territory' at Canberra, struck work as a result of a meeting in which it was decided that camping conditions on the Capital site were unsatisfactory.