WAIRARAPA EMPLOYERS' ASSOCIATION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3204, 2 June 1909, Page 3

WAIRARAPA EMPLOYERS' ASSOCIATION.

ANNUAL REPORT. The following is the annual report of the Wairarapa Employers' Association to be presented to the annual meeting of members on Friday next:— "In presenting its Annual Report and Balance Sheet your Committee regrets that employers of labour do not display the interest in the Association which the importance of the interests at stake ought to call forth. Whilst a number of new members have been induced to join the Association during the past year and its numerical strength is greater than ever it has been, quite a number of old members have allowed their subscriptions to fall into arrear, with the result that the income has fallen under the expenditure, and the Association will have to depend upon the incoming years' subscriptions to pay liabilities incurred last year, and in consequence will be crippled for want of funds during the coming year, unless the membership can be largely increased. At the annual meeting of the Employers' Federation held in October last in Wellington your delegates, Mr J. 0. Bidwill and Mr J.D. Cruickshank, brought forward at the request of the Association a resolution affirming the desirability of very much smaller Industrial Districts. The resolution was carried unanimously and it will be for the incoming Committee to press this matter upon the notice of the Government the more especially as the present Minister for Labour has expressed himself as favourable to the proposed smaller districts. Your Committee takes this opportunity of placing on record its very high appreciation of the services rendered bf Mr Wrn. Pryor Secretary of the Employers' Federation and of the conspicuous ability he has displayed in conducting cases for the employers in the Arbitration Court. Your Committee having had no experience of the new Conciliation Councils is unable to express an opinion as to how they will work in actual practice. At the present time the Bakers' Operative, Union had made an application for a Pastry Cook's award, and within the next few days the Conciliation Council will take the matter, in hand. Your Committee will watch the proceedings of the Council with t much interest, with a view of finding out »f the Conciliation Councils will be any better than the Conciliation Board they have displaced. At the last annual meeting no Holidays Committee was elected. It will be for you to say ; if you think it desirable to set up j such u Committee this year, and if 1 so to indicate what steps should be ' taken to enable the Committee to work in harmony with the Mayor and Borough Council.