COULD NOT STEER.

Taranaki Daily News, 29 December 1922, Page 4

COULD NOT STEER.

ALLEGATIONS AGAINST FRE LABORERS. DENIAL BY CAPTAIN. t Telegraph-—Press Association. Wellington, Dec. 28. The assistant-secretary of the Seamen’s Union, Mr. F. C. Howell, makes the statement that the seamen and firemen on the Moeraki are not competent. He states that, according to J. Neill, a passenger on the Moeraki, there was only one competent firemen, and on Sunday, December 19, between 4 a.m. and 8 a.m., the ship only steamed U knots, there being only two men in the stokehold. Also the* majority of the men employed as seamen could not ateer the ship, and were driven info the stokehold to assist in firing the furnaces. The passengers were appealed to, and members of the English cricket team responded. The union official also published a signed statement made by two other passengers to a similar effect. On being shown the statement this morning Captain Clift, of the MoeraTJ. said the men in the deck department and stokehold were all qualified. Some had not been at sea for some time, but one deck hand held a master’s certificate and another a second mate’s ticket, while some had been able seamen. With regard to the allegation that some seamen could not steer, Captain Clift declared that they were excellent men at the wheel, and made better courses with the ship than members of the regular crew. Men were not “driven into the stokehold.” The position was that two extra men were being carried on deck, and, a« they were not required, were sent to the stokehold. It was absolutely false to say that the passengers were appealed to and and that members of the cricket team responded. The cricketers were not asked to go into the stokehold. Captain Clift also stated that during the trip to Auckland the ship averaged fully 11 knots per hour.