TRADE TRAINING

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 September 1941, Page 4

TRADE TRAINING

MEETING SKILLED LABOUR SHORTAGE. STATEMENT BY MINISTER. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. An outline of what was being done to train tradesmen rapidly in order to expand production, was given by the Minister of Labour. Mr Webb, in the House of Representatives last evening. Reports on men who had had four months’ training in engineering schools attached to the technical colleges were most encouraging,, he said. In Christchurch, representatives of the union and the employers were 'now conducting an investigation to find the type of work for which the trainees were most suitable, and to try to an agreement about wages. Trainees at the boot manufacturing school in Auckland had made such progress and the demand for them was so great that manufacturers had agreed to ballot for them. About 50 men were receiving four months’ training at a carpentery school at Miramar, Wellington, and on completion of the course they would go to the Housing Department. Il was hoped to train men at the rate of about 150 a year at this school. “With the shocking housing conditions of this city alone, where we have families living in rooms that are a disgrace to civilisation, we should train as many carpenters and build as many homes as we can,” said Mr Webb.