EMPLOYING YOUTH.

Waikato Times, Volume 119, Issue 19899, 30 May 1936, Page 23 (Supplement)

EMPLOYING YOUTH.

iMINISTER’S ALLEGATIONS. BILL PASSES ALL STAGES. \VELLINGTON, Friday. .\n allegation that some members of :ihe ‘Opposition were deliberately hold~ in; up the passage of the Shops and Offices Amendment Bill in the interests 01’ a class of unscrupulous employers was made by the Hon. H. 'l‘. Armstrong, iMinister of Labour, in the House of ißepresentative-s to-day. The Bill was iread a third time and passed. having lgone through all stages without a di—vision. I For more than an hour members of the Opposition had been trying strenuously to persuade the Govern—ment to drop the clause in the Bill which states that in determining the rate of payment to employees all previous terms of employment must he ‘iaken into account. The general View of the Opposition was that the clause would prevent the employment of youths anxious to leave one occupation and start in another for which they‘ were better suited. i .\ir Armstrong replied that all over iiuz Dominion ‘at present employers were inking on Eboys and girls at the minimum rate, employing them for a your, dismissing them and iimn re—engaging them at the minimum rate “El-ill]. That was what the employers \\ure engineering for at the moment in seeking the exclusion ot‘ the clause under discussion. “A Conspiracy." “I Know all about the conspiracy which is going on between some of the leading lights in the legal profession, for instance, who are busy advising the employers and organism tions such as guilds of workers 110 W to act to get outside this law. But it these people get away with it at the moment we will bring down legislation and we will make it retrospective, which will make them comply with the law," added the Minister. Several Opposition members vigorously denied that the Opposition had acted on instructions to delay the Bill. M~:If-_‘-_m