WATERSIDERS WARNED

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 457, 12 September 1928, Page 1

WATERSIDERS WARNED

Government Will Step In SHIPOWNERS ACCEPT CHALLENGE Direct Defiance of Court /United P.A.—By Telegraph—Copyrightj Received 10.15 a.m. CANBERRA, to-day. The Prime Minister, Mr. Stanley Bruce, informed the Federal House of Representatives that the Government intended to take immediate and firm action to enforce observance of Judge Beeby’s Waterside Award.

“Tliis Parliament,” lie added,” ‘‘recently passed a measure designed to ensure obedience of awards, and tlie wharf-workers’ present action constitutes direct defiance of the court.” Mr. Bruce commented on the incessant trouble at Queensland ports, chiefly Cairns, where produce such as maize and sugar was rotting owing to waterfront troubles. Ho said he had communicated with the Premiers of all States, asking them to afford protection for free labour, and also to take such other steps as they deemed necessary to keep the ships running, with which action the Commonwealth Government would afford fullest co-operation. Mr. Bruce has telegraphed to the Waterside Federation a solemn warning embodying the Government’s intentions. SYDNEY MEN SATISFIED A Sydney message says the watersiders not only object to Judge Beeby’s provision for a second pick-up in the but they also contend that the new award imposes heavy penalties for minor breaches, and deprives their executive of considerable power. As a matter of fact, 95 per cent, of the Sydney watersiders are satisfied with the award, but there is considerable dissatisfaction in Melbourne, Brisbane and other ports, where shift work is involved. Although many ports throughout the Commonwealth were idle yesterday, hundreds of waterside workers offered for work at Sydney, and plenty of labour is available for all vessels. No distinction is being made for the steamers Baradine and Goulburn, which the men refused to work at the afternoon call on Monday. By offering in great numbers, the men showed their objection not to the ships or the line to which they belonged, but to the whole principle of the afternoon call.

An official statement issued by the oversea shipping representatives says: ‘ The oversea and inter-State shipping companies face two challenges, and accept both. One is the defiant tearing up of the waterside workers award by their federation, which we answer by taking a definite and final stand b" the award, and refusing to barter law and order for persistent chaos. NO WORK ON WHARVES “The second challenge is the question asked by Mr. Justice Beeby of the Federal Arbitration Court in his recent judgment: Will the shipping companies continue their policy of submission, or take a firm stand? We answer that challenge as emphatically as at first. The day of continual enforced concessions and piecemeal compromise is ended. We stand as a united body for arbitration as against anarchy, whether that anarchy be repudiation of the whole award or its tearing up clause by clause.” Reports from Brisbane, Hobart, Ade laide, Perth, and Fremantle say there was no work on the waterfront yesterday. The men refused employment at the morning call. The Cormorin, which arrived at Fremantle from London, had to continue her voyage without discharging her cargo. At Melbourne, although the men were chosen to work many vessels at the morning call, they left the wharves when told they were engaged under the new award. "With the exception of coal steamers and those on the Tasmanian services and the Patrick Line steamers, inter-State shipping is at a standstill, and by this evening thousands of workers in Melbourne will be idle. The shipowners are preparing to pay off the crews and refund the passage moneys. The overseas and interstate shipping companies have refused a further request by the waterside workers for a conference, stating that a necessary preliminary is the observance of the new award.