BUTTER WORKERS’ DISPUTE.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIII, Issue 9120, 13 April 1908, Page 6

BUTTER WORKERS’ DISPUTE.

Per Press Association. Wellington, April 11. n The Conciliation Board on ‘Friday filed its recommendations in the Wellington butter, creamery, and cheese factory workers’ dispute. The minimum weekly wages recommended are as follows :—Butterworkers £8 10s, cheesemakers £8 10s, engine drivers £2 10s, creamery managers £3 ss; other workers, not including youths, £3 ss; youths from 16 to 17 years not less than 15s per week, 17 to 18 years 25s per week; casual, workers not less than one-eighth m addition to the foregoing rates. No preference is recommended to unionists. Employers must provide suitable house accommodation, with fuel. All workers to receive not less than two quarts of milk per day, butter makers not less than 21b of butter per week, and cheesemakers 21b of cheese or their equivalent in money. Wages for creamery managers not to cover carting of cream, fuel or stores; re- ; muneration for this work *to he mutually agreed upon. Wages are to be paid fortnightly with two weeks’ , notice on either side of termination of services. In every creamery where the milk received per day exceeds 20,000 pounds an assistant must be employed at not less than 25s per week. A week’s work not to exceed 54 hours of work in or in connection with creamery, to be subject tomutual agreement; overtime to he paid at the following rates First four hours time and a quarter; next four hours time and a half; double thereafter ;|overtime not to be charged until the aggregate number of hours actually worked shall have exceeded 54 hours. Every employee who hag worked not less than eight monthsi during one year for the same employer to receive fourteen days’ holiday on full pay ; a holiday of; proportionate duration to be allowed every' worker who shall have worbed less than eight months during the same year for the same employer, but not less than sis mouths. Christmas Day and Good Friday to be observed as holidays; all work done on these days to be paid for at the rate of double time. Every factory to bs provided with a suitable bathroom and dressing room. No employer must discriminate against’members of the union nor do anything in the conduct of their business dircetly or indirectly for the purpose of injuring the Union. The duration of. the award is from May 10th, ■ 1908, until May 10th, 1910, unless- : superseded by another’award or industrial agreement. In a memorandum the Board points out that whereas the Union asked for a 48-hours week, the members, after personal inspection, were of the opinion that by the adoption of more systematic methods the hours of labour might be curtailed' 1 but they were not prepared to recommend less than *34 hours a week. The clause providing for yearly holidays on full pay embodied the existing practice, and was obviously iutended to be compensating for the long hours necessarily worked during the busy season. The employers were desirous of having factories classified according to output and to have wages grade accordingly, but after careful consideration jof the : question of classification the Board had decided against its adoption, being influenced largely by the fact that though there were a few factories conducted on a much larger scale, the majority of the rates were much the same in large and small factories. The minimum wages recommended represented an increase in some factories but were . those now being paid in the great . majority of factories, while in some instances more was being paid. Having regard to the circumstances with regard to the claim for preference to Unionists more especially to the fact that the factories are widely scattered and often in remote parts of the industrial district, the Board had by a majority decided not to recommend preference. With this exception, the recommendations represented the unanimous finding of the Board.