Trades and the Workers

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 618, 21 March 1929, Page 6

Trades and the Workers

By

"ARBITER"

UNION MEETING DATES

Thursday. March 21 to-night) .. Alliance of Labour. Friday, March 22 Drivers’ Picnic Committee. Monday, March 25 •• Painters. Monday, March 25 •• •• •• •• Bricklayers. Tuesday, March 26 . • Stonemasons

Labour is busy preparing for the municipal elections, and a great deal of organisation is being effected to ensure that worker-electors are alive to their responsibilities at the polls. A selection ballot for Labour candidates for the City Council and Hospital Hoard elections will be held at the beginning of next week.

Court Kept Busy The Arbitration Court, which commenced its sittings in Auckland at the beginning of last week, removed to Hamilton on Saturday, and, after hearing applications to add parties to awards, the hairdressers' dispute, and a peculiar compensation case, the members returned to resume their Auckland sittings yesterday morning. Intermittently, there is sufficient work to keep the court occupied in this district until the beginning of May.

Work For 300 Men It is estimated that, if the Transport Hoard's loans for tramway extensions are carried, 300 men will be kept in work for five years. Some unions are circularising their members to encourage them to vote for the loans, which in the past have been turned down for some inexplicable reason. Workers in the suburbs have had a taste of the hardships of straphanging in recent months, however, and it is unlikely that their votes will be cast against the proposals when they are brought down. Once the work starts, the service can be put through to Point Chevalier, for instance, in six months.

Loyalty To Leader Inquiry among trade unions in Auckland indicates that never in the history of the labour movement in this country has there been such united loyalty to leadership than the workers are now showing to Mr. H. E. Holland, leader of the party. It was suggested a week or two ago that there was a’ split in the ranks. Inquiry fails to locate this friction. The timber workers have expressed their appreciation and thanks for what Mr. Holland has done for Labour, and also have expressed their gratitude to the Parliamentary Labour Group for its services. It is well to have the assurance that there is no disloyalty to Labour’s leader, as loyalty and co-operation are required now more than ever before. In any case, it would be a sorry thing Indeed for Labour to let down the man who has fought their battles for many years, and placed the party on its feet as a political entity in this country. If there bo a deficiency in the fulfilment of the party’s aims, then the people themselves are to blame, and not the handful of men who represent them in Parliament.

Timber’s Difficult Position A move toward placing the timber industry upon a sound basis is being made by the Auckland Timber Workers’ Union, which passed a resolution this week on the following lines: "The serious condition of the industry demands that steps should be taken to stabilise it. This union is of opinion that immediate endeavours should be made to call a conference of •mployers and employees with the object of placing the position before tiie Government.” At this conference, which is being arranged by the secretary. Mr. E. J. Phelan, it is suggested that the whole Industry should be reviewed. No effort Is to be made to stop importations, but the importation of timber in sawn lengths will be objected to strenuously, so that local workers can cut it up within the country. It is calculated that, by cutting out the importation of sawn timber, work could be given to 3.000 men in the Auckland Province alone.

The Cheap Labourer The growing inclination of the Dalmatian labourer to impose upon the country which has given him economic shelter was referred to in the Arbitration Court during a recent compensation case. A Dalmatian who had been suffering a progressive disease in his spine claimed life compensation because of a fail, which he said had aggravated the injury. The judge, in dismissing his claim, told him he was fifc foolish man not to have accepted the original offer of one years’ compensation from his employer. It was then mentioned by counsel that foreign labourers were displaying a growing tendency to bring their cases before the court, on the chance of getting compensation.

There is an important principle involved in this assertion. Of course, the New Zealand worker will possess no regrets if the employer of Dalmatian labour is hit—he asks for that when he takes on a cheap foreigner. But the local wage-earner has a genuine case against the foreigner, who cuts wages, works all hours of day and night, works hard when the boss is looking, and becomes so bumptious to his European colleagues that in some public works he is set aside in a camp of his own. None will deny a fair spin to any worker who is seeking justice, but the man who competes on unfair conditions must take what is coming to him in the straightening-out process.

Apprentice To Attend Class During the current sitting of the Arbitration Court, application will be made to have the following clause added to the painters’ apprenticeship orders: “If ordered to do so by the court or the committee, any apprentice residing within a radius of 20 miles from a technical college or school or other approved institution, shall during the first four years of his apprenticeship, or until he had obtained his certificate, attend a class in painting and decorating. In such case the employer shall pay the fees for each term, and if the apprentice fails through his own fault to attain less than 70 per cent, of the maximum possible. it shall be competent for the employer to deduct the fees from the wages of the apprentice by weekly deductions not exceeding 5s a week.’’

Safeguards To Health After hearing the case of the stonemasons, the Timber Workers’ Union took up tho case of the 15 men who are out of work from the new Auckland railway station job on account of a dispute over a surfacing machine. The timber workers wrote to the Government. and received a letter in reply from th Minister of Health, acting on behalf of tho Minister of Labour, both of whom are affected by the dispute.

The Minister pointed out that the Arbitration Court’s decision, that the machine used was a machine surfacer, was merely one of award interpretation. When the award itself came be-

fore the court this month, the general question of the use of these machines could be considered. The letter concluded: “As regards the effect of the machines upon the health of the workers, officers of the department have reported that certain safeguards are necessary, and Messrs. Hansford and Mills, the contractors, have intimated that they will instal any safeguards which the department may require.”

Fruits of Organisation An illustration of what organised labour—working quietly but efficiently —does for the worker, was afforded hy a case which has been brought to the notice of “Arbiter.” Here it is: A man came to the office of his union. “I have had my thumb cut off to the first joint,” he said. “Are you sure it is to the joint?” the secretary asked, because this means a great deal in the compensation claim. •‘Yes, it is to the joint, I am sure.” “Then,” the secretary went on, having a look at the case, “your compensation is about £234.” That was all right. The man returned later and complained that he was entitled to compensation only for a few weeks, and produced a certificate from a doctor—a woman, by the way—that the thumb had been cut above the first joint. This excluded him from compensation. “Well,” the secretary asked, “what do you say?” “I am sure it is off at the joint,” the worker responded. The union then paid for an X-ray photograph, and it was found that the

thumb had been amputated below the first joint. The effect of it was this: By her first certificate, the careless doctor made the man eligible for compensation at the rate of £3 a week only, for about seven weeks; the indisputable X-ray photograph entitles him to £ 234. Organised labour —his union—therefore, has saved that man the loss of £2lO. This case is ten times more convincing than tho whole of “Arbiter’s” preaching about the necessity for organisation among the workers.