STRIKE THREAT.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 214, 10 September 1928, Page 7

STRIKE THREAT.

SHIPPING UPHEAVAL. Watersiders Will Not Work Under Beeby Award. EMPLOYERS READY. (Received 11 a.m.) MELBOURNE, this day. Another shipping upheaval is threatening. The waterside workers' officials declare that if the owners attempt to enforce the Beeby award a strike will occur in every port in Australia. Steps will be taken to-morrow to form one big maritime union. Shipowners say they are prepared to meet, the men in a conference, but decline to become parties to any arrangement outside the scope of the new award, since-they have already spent considerable sums in producing evidence in the Court for its guidance in making the existing award.

Particular objection was directed by delegates representative of all branches of the Australian Watersiders' Federation, at a special conference last week, at one clause in the award. This insists that members of the federation should, in the majority of ports, Beek work for the whole period of eight hours daily, whereas the custom has been to offer for engagement on the average of only two hours daily.

RATES OF PAY.

Basis Of Discussion With Owners. PRINCIPLES OF BEEBY AWARD. (Received 12 noon.) SYDNEY, this day. The union officials are suggesting that a basis for discussion with the owners should be the rates of pay and the conditions existing under the former award. The shipowners will probably have an informal talk with the union delegates to-day or to-morrow. Inquiries among the shipowners' representatives in Sydney and Melbourne, however, elicit the fact that they intend to insist on an observance of the main principles of the Beeby award.