LAKE COLERIDGE WORKS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 314, 2 July 1912, Page 5

LAKE COLERIDGE WORKS

SERIOUS ALLEGATIONS. By Telegraph— Press Association. • Christchurch, Last Night. According to men who have been employed at the Lake Coleridge hydro-elec-trical installation works, the conditions under which the men are employed on the tunnel contract labor are fur from satisfactory. James Ryan, a miner, who has been engaged at mining all his life, stated to a newspaper reporter to-day that the conditions at Lake Coleridge are the worst he has ever known. He was working at the outlet portion of the tunnel and described the country he worked through as consisting mostly of a kind of sand, with boulders in it. Three shifts after he went down to work in this position of the tunnel two men were nearly killed owing to a fall of earth and stones from the roof. He alleges that with three men in a shift 6ft per day is being driven. He further alleges that the timbering is a long way behind, and contends that in such soft country the timber should be kept close up to the men working on the face. There are, he states, chains without timbering, and he anticipates serious trouble unless something is done when the men meet who are driving the tunnel from the opposite end. He himself took from the roof a boulder weighing twenty pounds, which, if it had landed on a vital spot, would have been sufficient to kill a man. On another occasion two men had the tools knocked from their hands by a fall of earth from the roof. When Ryan spoke to the leader of the shift on the subject lie replied: "I think timber is wanted, but the boss thinks different." Ryan's statements were corroborated by another man who had worked on the works. This man also complained that the mr- < --dn-ed by the contractor for the tuiinii ■■•■!> practically compelled to board at a boardinghouse kept by the contractor, wlio is alleged to have laid it down that unless the men board at his boardinc-house ■they know what to do. Tt is further alleged that he will not allow the men to ''bach," and in this respect the co-opera-tive workers employed directly by the Public "Works Department are said to be (better off, as they.are allowed to I "bach" in tents, which can be made cosy. Ryan and Elliott stated that the food supplied at the board ins-house was not satisfactory, consisting chiefly of mutton cooked in different ways and potatoes. One woman, it is alleged, has to cook and wait on about forty men. At crib time the men at work on the tunnel have to take their food.in the onen air under very cold climatic conditions. They .state the contractor has no difficulty in getting men. but manv leave as | soon as they can, owing to the alleged ] unsatisfactory conditions.