RAILWAY TROUBLES

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 317, 5 July 1912, Page 5

RAILWAY TROUBLES

) ALLEGED DISMISSALS. I By Telegraph—Press Association. Christchurch, Last Night. A message received here from Inveroargill yesterday commented on the dismissal of a number of employees in various branches of the Railway Department, and mentioned that several employees in the Invercargill workshops had been dismissed. An inquiry into the position of affairs in Christchurch was made by a reporter to-day. It was as- . cextained that so far as the locomotive branch of the service in the South Island was concerned the staffs were not being reduced. The locomotive department, which includes all the railway workshops in the South Island, is controlled from Addington, and the reporter was assured that no men had ,been dismissed from the Invercargill workshops. On the other hand, the new rolling stock programme promised by the Minister had been issued, and the workshops in the South Island engaged in the repairing, overhauling and manufacturing of engines, waggons and carriages would be very'busy for a considerable time to come. An order had been issued for new rolling stock, and instructions had been given to put the work in hand as soon as possible. A suggestion was made that the complaint might refer to the maintenance workshops r.t Invercargill, and the reply was that in each district these workshops were under the control of the district engineer. Further inquiry elicited that, as far as the maintenance '' department in the Canterbury district was concerned, no instructions had been received to pay off hands. The position j locally was that a shortage of men existed in some of the branches of the maintenance works. Those from whom the information was obtained were inclined to think that the Invercargill matter was a small local affair, which had probably been exaggerated.