WELLINGTON WHARF WORK.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 77, 7 May 1914, Page 13

WELLINGTON WHARF WORK.

PRIORITY OF ENGAGEMENT. Preaa Association. WELLINGTON, May 6. Mr W. G. Foster, chairman of the Wellington Defence Committee, to-day issued the following letter in reply to complaints by the watersiders regarding the conditions on the waterfront:— '' In view of frequent reference to the unsatisfactory conditions of affairs at the waterfront and to the suggestion from the Minister that I should make closer enquiry into the matter, I arranged a meeting with Messrs Radcliff and Jones, the president and secretary respectively of the union. As the result of that meeting there was a meeting of the executive of the Defence Committee, at which I had arranged the union should be represented, this with a view to the union submitting direct its complaints generally. It has already been made public that the union's principal ground of complaint was its non-representation during the investigation by a special committee of complaints it had put in. . To remedy this the Defence Commit-,, tee offered to substitute another committee, with an independent chairman, composed of two representatives of the employers and two of the union." This was declined. A further meeting of the Defence Committee was called to consider this refusal, . when the following resolutions were passed: —'That the employers of waterside labour furnish a statement to the Complaints Committee as to measures taken to secure the executive working of priority of engagement on the waterfront, and that such statement be published by the committee'; 'that as the executive of the Wellington Waterside Workers' Union has disclaimed further responsibility in the matter of assisting men entitled to priority of engagement, and owing to the fact that the register of names of the men entitled to priority furnished by the executive of the union to the employers has been found to be very inaccurate, those members of the union who are entitled to priority be requested to register their names with Mr E. 11. Dodd, Johnston Street.' Both the Defence Committee and the special committee are of opinion that the direct employers have endeavoured to carry out their pledge to the uttermost, but that there has been a great deal wanting from the other side."