Engineers Scarce: Better Advantages Offering Overseas

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 66, Issue 86, 22 January 1946, Page 2

Engineers Scarce: Better Advantages Offering Overseas

TIMARU, This Day. New Zealand to-day is suffering from a shortage of qualified engineers. Compared with other professions, engineering is said to command a low basic salary and the result is twofold: for many years fewer boys have taken up engineering as a career and and students graduating from the Universities seek employment in their profession in other countries, where more attractive salaries are offered. This shortage, considered to be serious in a country where many major works are requiring to be done now and in the future, was recently brought home to the South Canterbury Catchment Board. Last December the Board called for applications for an assistant engineer and only one applicant responded. He was not appointed because his qualifications did not. comply with the conditions of appointment. The salary to begin was £6OO a year, which was considered to be the basic salary for engineers. Now the Board is advertising again, offering a starting salary of £7OO a year, rising to £SQO. Commenting on the position, the chief engineer of the Catchment Board (Mr R. G. Milward) said yesterday that the reason for the shortage of engineers dated back to 1930. During the economic depression few cadets were taken by private employers, local bodies and Government departments. Then again, parents with depleted incomes could not afford University fees to the same extent as when times were better. Salaries Remain Stationary

“After the slump period, and with the advent of the Labour Government, there was Increased activity in local body and departmental works requiring engineers,” Mr Milward continued. “Although the wages of workers gradually began to rise, thelsalaries of engineers remained more or less stationary. Engineering as a profession began to look less attractive to boys and their parents, and other professions appeared to offer better prospects. Many students Avho did qualify left New Zealand for positions overseas. It has been estimated, in fact, that, until 1938, almost 50 per cent of students graduating in engineering from Canterbury College went to other countries to earn their living.” Then came the war, which interrupted the studies of young men and also lessened the necessity for many engineers, except those employed on defence works. Few cadets appeared to have been engaged, during the period 1939-1944 and graduates from the University had been few. “Now that the war is over, the Public Works Department and local bodies generally are embarking on extensive works, partly to make up leeway as the result of certain works being deferred for the duration of the war and partly on new development works,” said Mr Milward. “The country is faced with a most inadequate number of engineers to cope with all these undertakings, and I think the position is serious. “It is therefore imperative that the engineering profession should regain the status it enjoyed 20 years ago, in that, the prospective remuneration will have to be sufficient both to attiact more of the right type of students and to retain them in their native land when they liave completed their training.”