GENERAL LABOURERS' AWARD.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 208, 2 September 1926, Page 16

GENERAL LABOURERS' AWARD.

AND FAMILY ALLOWANCES BILL RESOLUTIONS BT TRADES AND j LABOUR COUNCIL. DISSATISFACTION EXPRESSED. At the last meeting of the Auckland Trades and Labour Council two matters which gave rise to considerable discussion were the recent award covering general labourers, and the Family Allowances Bill, being considered by Parliament. The following resolutions were passed, and the secretary instructed to forward them to the Prime Minister: '•This council is in accord with the principle underlying the Government's proposal of family allowances for all children over the number of two in each family, as the idea was first enunciated in the Labour party's policy; but we desire most emphatically to express our dissatisfaction with the miserable and totally inadequate sum of two shillings per child per week, as proposed in the bill now before Parliament: further, we take strong exception to the limit of wages being fixed at £4 per week to qualify, as this wage does not allow of a proper standard of living being maintained. The Arbitration Court, with no proper sense of equity, has fixed the basic wage at £4 1/ per week; and the Government's bill undercuts even the parsimony of the Court. There are many workers receiving a higher rate that the Government's high-water mark of £4 per week, who also need assistance, when having to make provision for children over the number of two. This council holds the opinion that a government that proposes to allocate two hundred thousand pounds in bringing immigrants to the Dominion, should well afford to assist the families of those who are already in the Dominion and many of whom -were born here." "In view of the recent award declared by the Court of Arbitration, practically affecting the general labourers throughout the Dominion, in which, inter alia, an increase of wages, agreed to by employers in other industries, has been refused by the Court, this Auckland Trades and Labour Council, composed of 25 trades unions, considers that Mr. Justice Frazer, as president of the Court, should be replaced by a president who will give effect to the weight of evidence adduced, instead of following out predetermined conclusions. This council has been guided to tnis conclusion by: (1) The employers, under the Canterbury General Labourers' Award, had previously recognised the justice of the application of the workers for an increase of pay, by agreeing to a mini-mum-rate for labourers of 1/11 per hour, instead of the 1/10 afterwards granted by the Court; (2) The refusal to grant an increase of one penny per hour to a general labourer is a big factor in correspondingly reducing the pay of skilled" workers, as unskilled labour *ie the base of all other callings, skilled or otherwise; (3) In declaring this latest wage. • figure, it is evident to this council that the majority of the Court has not taken into consideration the fact that a ral labourer is subject to loss of earning power by wet -weather, casual work and public holidays. The rate, therefore, declared by the recent award, ie clearly not a living wage in these deVe of high and exorbitant rents" The council also endorsed the protest made by Mr. A. L. Monteith, -the W u II i; c P reßen tative on the Court when the General Labourers' Award was